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Heely' s liibpapy of Choice liitepatafe 

. __ 

Campaigns 



OF 



Curiosity 



Journalistic Adventures of an 
American Girl in London 




BY 

Elizab eth L. Baft] 

F. Tennyson Neely 

Publisher 
Chicago New York 



's Librnrv ftf (IllftlVp Tiiforatiirp ' No. 38. Dec. 18M. Issued monthly. $6.00 a year. Entered at 
a LlUldlV VI VIHMIC LI Midline , chwnfrn Post Offino as Spp.nn/i-f!lflss lVTatter 



I Chicago Post Office as Second-Class Matter. 



••• 



NEELY'S 

INTERNATIONAL 

LIBRARY 



IN UNIFORM CLOTH BINDING, 
$1.25 EHCH. 



LOURDES— Zola. 

AT MARKET VALUE— Grant Allen. 

Author of "The Duchess of Powysland," "This Mortal 
Coil," "Blood Royal," "The Scallywag," Etc. 

RACHEL DENE— Robert Buchanan. 

Author of "The Shadow of the Sword," "God and the 
Man," Etc. 

A DAUGHTER OF THE KING— Alien. 
THE ONE TOO MANY— E. Lynn Linton. 

Author of "Patricia Kimball," " The Atonement of Learn 
Dundas," "Through the Long Night," Etc. 

A MONK OF CRUTA— E. Phillips Oppenheim. 
IN THE DAY OF BATTLE— J. A. Steuart. 

Author of " Kilgroom," " Letters to Living Authors," Etc. 

THE GATES OF DAWN— Fergus Hume. 

Author of " Mystery of a Handsome Cah," "Miss Mephis- 
topheles," Etc. 

IN STRANGE COMPANY-Guy Boothby. 

Author of "On the Wallaby." 



For Sale by all Booksellers, or will be sent postpaid 
on receipt of price by the Publisher. 



TENNYSON NEELY, 
CHICAGO. 



CAMPAIGNS OF CURIOSITY 




ELIZABETH L. BANKS. 

{From a Photograph by the London Stereoscopic Company.) 



Campaigns of Curiosity 






t\ 



JOURNALISTIC ADVENTURES OF AN 
AMERICAN GIRL IN LONDON 



BY 




Elizabeth L. Banks 



tfc*\l*°^ 




F. TENNYSON NEELY, 
Chicago. Publisher: 

1894. 



New York. 



v 



h 






T«E LIBRARY 
WASHllTOTOwi 



Copyright, 1895 

BY 

F. TENNYSON NEELY. 



^4// rights reserved. 



CONTENTS 



PREFACE 



IN CAP AND Ar Ron- 
chapter 

I. " Liberty " and ' 



Independence" 
Seeking a Situation 
"Elizabeth Barrows," Housemaid 
Rough Places "Smoothed Over" 
Without a " Character " . 
Parlourmaid to Mrs. Brownlow 
My Last Days in Service . 



II. 
III. 

IV. 
V. 
VI. 
VII. 
VIII. The Merits of Domestic Service 

THE "ALMIGHTY DOLLAR" IN LONDON SOCIETY 

CHAPTER 

I. Advertising for a Chaperon 

II. Offers of Marriage 

III. What it would Cost . 

IV. Interesting Antecedents 

THE PRICE OF A PEDIGREE 
SWEEPING A CROSSING . 
A DAY WITH THE FLOWER-GIRLS 
AMONG THE LAUNDRY-GIRLS— 

CHAPTER 

I. Why and How I Became One of Them 

II. At Work in a "Sanitary Laundry" 

III. A Contest with Flat-Irons 

IV. The Day of My Resignation 
V. "Soap-suds Island" and the East-End 



PAGB 

ix 



I 
9 

21 

33 

45 
59 

72 

84 



97 
101 

106 
in 

"5 

129 

139 



'53 
165 

'75 
[86 
[96 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 



PAGE 

Portrait of the Authoress • • • • Frontispiece 

Headpiece • . . . x 

Initial i 

*' No Fringe allowed ! " . •••••• 17 

"Elizabeth Barrows," Housemaid . . . . 25 

My System of Scrubbing 56 

" The Contents came whizzing up in my Face " . .69 
"There on the step stood Mr. James BRowNLOw ,, . 78 
"He wished to Marry a Lady of Wealth" . . .103 
"My Costume was not quite Orthodox" • • .134 

"I felt Meek and Lowly" 145 

"A Dozen Girls and Women were Ironing". • . 166 

Janie . 168 

"Lizzie Barnes," Laundry-girl. . . • • . 180 
"Carn't yer see we've got a young laidy with us" . 200 
Tailpiece • • 1 •••••• 208 



PREFACE. 



When, a little over a year ago, I arrived in Lon- 
don with a star-spangled banner in my pocket, I 
had no intention of remaining long enough to make 
any extensive experiments in the line of the " newer 
journalism." I had only "taken a run" over to 
England to visit Westminster Abbey, St. Paul's, 
and the Tower, expecting then to return home and 
write up my "impressions" of London and Lon- 
doners. 

" Don't forget that you are an American, and are 
going to England simply to compare the inferiorities 
of that country with the superiorities of your own." 
This was the parting injunction of a certain American 
editor when I left New York. 

For some time after my arrival I not only never 
forgot that I was an American, but I took particular 
pains that nobody else should forget it. I waved the 
Stars and Stripes en every possible occasion, and 
sighed for an opportunity to defend my country. It 
was not long in coming, for I had been in London 
but a little over two weeks when Mr. Rudyard Kip- 
ling's criticisms of America appeared in the Times. 
My patriotic outburst, which I headed " An American 
Girl's Reply to Mr. Kipling," was printed in the same 
paper a few days later, and Uncle Sam sent me his 
congratulations across the water. That was the be- 
ginning of my journalistic career in London — a career 
that has not been without its pleasures as well as 
some very hard work. 



x Campaigns of Curiosity, 

At the end of a few months I began to like 
London so well that I decided to stop longer, in 
order to study something more than the " inferiori- 
ties " that my patriotic American co-worker had 
bidden me seek, so I hung up my flag in the hall 
where it might be seen without being too obtrusive, 
and turned my attention to active work. 

When I wrote my " In Cap and Apron " expe- 
ritnces for the Weekly Sun, I determined to say 
nothing about my nationality, and in correcting the 
proofs I thought I divested the narrative of all obvious 
Americanisms. But, alas ! it was the " wash-bowls " 
and " pitchers " that betrayed me. 

" Does not Miss Banks know how to use proper 
English, that she says 'bowl' instead of basin, and 
* pitcher' instead of jug?" wrote an irate matron to 
one of the papers, and the Editor of the Weekly Sun 
was severely criticised for allowing "vulgar Ameri- 
can" to appear in its columns. Another lady 
declared that I must be a person of strangely car- 
nivorous tastes to demand a meat breakfast, which 
led to a letter from someone else, who gave it as her 
opinion that I must have come from America, a land 
where the inhabitants breakfasted off chops and 
steaks and buckwheat cakes. Many epistles came to 
me personally : some from ladies who seemed to be 
under the impression that I had come to London to 
set up the servants against the mistresses, and I was 
requested to return to America before I raised an 
insurrection. 

On the other hand, the servants looked upon 
me as a sort of Moses II., come to deliver them 
out of the hand of their oppressors, and the con- 



Preface. X1 

gratulatory letters that some of them sent me were 
rather amusing. After I finished my description of 
my life at Mrs. Allison's, and began to write con- 
cerning my experiences at Mrs. Brownlow's — I need 
hardly say that I have not given the real names or 
addresses of these people in any case — everybody 
turned round about face. The mistresses concluded 
that I was not half bad, after all ; while the servants 
abused me because I advised them that it was wrong 
" to break and not tell." One housemaid, in her 
rage, wrote that she had intended suggesting that I be 
made an officer of the Domestic Servants' Protective 
League, but now I would be denied that honour, as 
every " proper servant " in London was my enemy. 

During the time that I was relating my experi- 
ences as housemaid and parlourmaid, Mrs. Allison 
and Mrs. Brownlow received condolences from many 
quarters, though it appeared to me that the sym- 
pathy was wasted ; for neither of them were such 
objects for public pity as some people seemed to 
imagine. Mrs. Allison, in particular, was looked 
upon as a deeply-injured woman, a sort of martyr, 
"butchered," as one writer expressed it, "to make a 
journalistic holiday." So far as I have been able to 
discover, no serious consequences attended my house- 
maiding exploit at Mrs. Allison's. To be sure, the 
scrubbing was woefully neglected during my regime, 
but otherwise the housemaid's duties were not so 
badly performed. 

To those who understand how small the world 
really is, it will not appear strange that Mrs. Allison 
and I should have mutual acquaintances. Quite 
recently a friend invited me to accompany her to a 



xii Campaigns of Curiosity. 

Sunday " at home," where, I was assured, I would be 
welcomed by a charming hostess and meet most 
agreeable people. The house to which she would 
have taken me was that of Mrs. Allison, of Portman 
Square ! On hearing the name, I suddenly remem- 
bered that I was " writing against time," and the 
printers were waiting for copy. I have several times 
met my former mistress and her daughters on the 
street, and at the theatre we have often been near 
neighbours ; but my change of costume proved a 
good disguise, and I doubt if they would know me 
unless I appeared to them in the garb of cap and apron. 

The Brownlows forgave me for the deception I 
had practised upon them, and then went to America, 
to recuperate their fortunes, which, Mr. Brownlow 
said, had suffered considerably through the mistakes 
of the Cleveland Administration. 

The criticism which my " In Cap and Apron " 
articles excited was mild when compared with that 
called out by the appearance in the St. James's Gazette 
of " The Almighty Dollar in London Society " series. 
Not even yet am I able to understand how I merited it. 
I have felt somewhat in the position of the unlucky 
cat which suffered drowning at the hands of the cruel 
Johnnie Green, although, according to the nursery 
rhyme — « 

"It never did him any harm, 
But caught the mice in his father's barn." 

When I acted the part of an American heiress, I not 
only exposed the methods by which certain English 
aristocrats sold their social influence, but I held up 
to ridicule the shoddiness of some of my own country- 
people, who are well known on two sides of the 



Preface. xiii 

Atlantic. In explaining that Lady chaperoned 

Miss Porkolis for a particular sum of money, I did 
not attempt to excuse the young Chicagoan for her 
part in the transaction ; for, surely, the purchaser of 
social distinction is not a whit better than the person 
who turns it into a marketable commodity. Further- 
more, I have not put forward Lady as being a 

typical specimen of all those who move in high 
society, any more than I have portrayed the repre- 
sentative American girl in Miss Porkolis. My object 
was but to show that the confidence Americans are 
accused of having in the purchasing power of " the 
almighty dollar" has not been altogether misplaced. 
I have noticed that the Colonial papers, especially 
those of Australia, have looked upon my American 
heiress campaign in the light of a huge joke played 
upon the aristocracy. A New Zealand Editor, in 
commenting upon the letters I received in answer to 
my advertisement for a chaperon, sighs for a peep 
into my desk, which, he thinks, must be brimful of 
interesting material that has not yet appeared in 
print. So far as those letters are concerned, I could 
safely hand him over the key ; for, aside from what 
is now in print, nothing of that interesting corre- 
spondence remains with me. Those who requested 
the return of their letters received them, and the rest 
were long ago consigned to the flames. 

As regards the chapter in which I describe my 
search for a pedigree, it is but another instance of 
what dollars and sovereigns will do. I do not, how- 
ever, hold up these would-be aristocrats as typical 
Americans. In the great hustle and bustle of our 
American life, dead and gone ancestors play no part. 



xiv Campaigns of Curiosity. 

So thoroughly do we believe in ourselves that self- 
confidence might almost be said to amount to self- 
sufficiency. We demand of a man not who his father 
was, but what he is himself. Yet, among over sixty 
millions of people, there must necessarily be a few 
snobs by way of variety, and that their money allows 
them to come to London to purchase the social pre- 
cedence that is denied them at home, and a line of 
ancestors made to order, is a misfortune to America 
and England alike. 

To the Editor of the English Illustrated Magazine 
I am indebted for the privilege of republishing the 
two articles which recount my experiences as a 
flower-girl and a crossing-sweeper. They do not 
take up any very serious social or moral problems, 
and so need not be further referred to here. 

My trial at laundry work was the most difficult 
task I have yet attempted, and that I lived through 
it, and long enough to put the adventure into print, 
is a fact that still causes me to wonder. The 
relation of my experiences, coming at a time when 
the question of shorter hours and more perfect sanita- 
tion for laundries has been brought before Parliament 
by the Home Secretary, I hope may not be without 
the effect of calling attention to a class of working 
girls who stand in great need of a helping hand from 
the better classes. 

If my exploits have done nothing more than to 
give many of my journalistic co-workers topics for 
some exceedingly clever and humorous " copy," 
they have not been altogether wasted. From the 
land of prose into the realm of poesy, Mr. Walter 
Besant wandered to tell the readers of the Queen 



Preface. xv 

something concerning the ambitions of " The Lady 
Housemaid." Mr. George R. Sims has given to the 
manufacturers of American furniture a valuable 
advertisement by describing for his " Refereaders " 
the wonderful transformations that took place in the 
star-spangled drawing-room where he called to inter- 
view me concerning the remarkable feats I performed 
as a parlourmaid, besides finding a plot for one of 
his ever-entertaining " dramas of the day." " The 
Coming of Elizabeth " has been graphically portrayed 
in the columns of Judy by a writer who, despite my 
effort to " calculate, reckon and guess " as to his 
identity, is yet unknown to me by name. Punch, in 
a page devoted to the doings of " The Irrepressible 
She," has hinted to its readers what they have soon to 
dread, if the progressive " lady journalist " is allowed 
to pursue the uneven tenor of her way. The Daily 
News, in a witty review of my " In Cap and Apron " 
series, complimented me on my journalistic prowess, 
but deplored my inability to sew on a button and my 
general lack of feminine accomplishments. "Auto- 
lycus," in the Pall Mall Gazette, gallantly defended 
me from the attack of an enemy in the Weekly 
Sun, who, in proclaiming the opinion that I had 
never been in service at all, gave me credit for 
such imaginative faculties as would bring me a fortune 
and spare me much labour, time, and expense. In 
the Lady's Pictorial, " Mary Jane " covered herself 
with ink and glory by her smart sketches in which 
she depicted her ambitious attempt to leave off house- 
work and " learn all about jernalism in two days." I 
prophesy for "Mary Jane" a brilliant future as a 
combined critic and sketch artist. 



xvi Campaigns of Curiosity. 

Numerous other weekly and daily journals have 
instructed and entertained their readers at my expense. 
The Press of my native land has also smiled ap- 
provingly upon me, and sent me invitations to return 
to the scenes of my early journalistic endeavours. 

I have been impressed by the kindly feeling that 
the women journalists of London have shown towards 
me and the interest they have exhibited in my work. 
Especially is this true of the members of the Pioneer 
and Writers' Clubs. Coming here a stranger from 
over the sea, I was warned in the beginning by a 
cynical " gentleman journalist " that I would be looked 
upon as an interloper ; but this has been far from the 
case, and among my co-workers in London I count 
many friends. 

From the Editors of the various London papers, 
also, I have received the most courteous consideration 
and friendly advice, although, to be sure, some of 
them have smilingly referred to my adventures as 
" escapades " which they have appeared to consider a 
sort of journalistic sowing of wild oats. 

Finally I wish to make my acknowledgments to 
the advertising columns of the daily papers. They 
have rendered me valuable assistance, without which 
these "Campaigns of Curiosity" could never have 
been written. 

E. L. B. 



jfeL^^oai© 




CAMPAIGNS OF CURIOSITY. 



IN CAP AND APRON. 

CHAPTER I. 

"LIBERTY" AND " INDEPENDENCE.* 

TITCH! stitch! stitch!" I 
stood in the doorway of 
a fifth-floor back-room in 
a Camberwell lodging- 
house, listening to a modern 
edition of " The Song of 
the Shirt," sung to the 
accompaniment of the sew- 
ing-machine. The scenery 
was similar to that painted 
by Thomas Hood half a 




2 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

century ago. The woman and the unwomanly rags, 
the crust of bread, the table, the straw, and the broken 
chair, all were there. The singer of the song sat at 
the machine, her head bent over the work which her 
hands were guiding, while her feet pushed the treadle 
up and down. I looked on until my brain grew 
weary with the monotony of her movements and the 
grating noise of the unlubricated wheel. 

" How much do you earn a day at that work ?" I 
asked. 

" Eighteenpence, Miss," was the answer. 

" And you pay for your lodging, food and clothes, 
all with that eighteenpence ? " 

" Yes, Miss." 

" But is there no other work you can do — nothing 
that is less wearing on body and brain ? " 

"Nothing, Miss. Some other girls that write a 
good hand get work in the City at £i a week, and 
some that are quick at figures earn almost as much 
in the shops ; but I can only sew. I bought my 
machine on time, and it's not paid for yet. Excuse 
me, but I must be on with my work." 

Stitch 1 stitch ! stitch ! The noise commenced 
again. 

" Stop ! " I cried. " I have it. I will help you. 
Can you do housework ? " 

" Why, yes, Miss, I suppose so," she answered, 
with wondering eyes. 

" Then fix yourself up a little and come with me. 
I will give you a place as housemaid in my home. 
What you don't know, you will soon learn. You 
shall have a nice clean bedroom, with plenty to eat, 
print dresses in the morning, black stuff in the after- 



In Cap and Apron. 3 

noon, with white caps and aprons, and collars and 
cuffs. I will buy them for you as we go along. We 
will pay you £16 a year to commence. Come, why 
don't you get your things on ? We will settle up 
the back rent and return the sewing-machine to the 
instalment people." 

The girl had risen from her chair and, to my 
astonishment, confronted me angrily, her cheeks 
aflame and her eyes blazing. 

"Did you come only to insult me ?" she demanded, 
stamping her feet. " I go out to service ! I wear 
caps and aprons, those badges of slavery ! No, 
thank you. I prefer to keep my liberty and be 
independent." 

What was she talking about? Her liberty, her 
independence ? I was bewildered, and could scarcely 
believe my ears. I had been so interested in this girl, 
and for the past two months had vainly tried to think of 
a plan whereby I could help her. I knew she was 
poor and proud, and would not take a penny from 
me unless she felt she had earned it. I had finally 
decided to give her a comfortable situation in my 
own home, and this was the way she received my 
suggestion. She had deemed my offer an insult. 
So this was the outcome of my maiden effort in the 
missionary line! She had asked for bread, and I, 
according to her way of thinking, had proffered her a 
stone. Disconsolate and disappointed, I left her, 
and in my bitterness was half resolved to steel my 
heart for ever against the woes of my own sex, and 
never again venture outside the legitimate paths of 
journalism. 

However, my cynical resolution was not carried 
B 2 



4 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

out, for the following day I was seized with a 
womanly curiosity to learn something more about 
this wonderful "liberty" the sewing girl seemed to 
value so highly ; and, with that in view, I passed con- 
siderable time among the working women of London, 
trying to gain a clue to the meaning of their war- 
cry, " Independence." Everywhere I heard that 
word. It sounded above the clickety-clack of the 
type-writer while the fingers flew over the keys ; the 
noisily-turning factory-wheels failed to drown it ; I 
heard it over the clink of the barmaid's glasses ; it 
mingled with the ring of the telephone-bell, the whirr 
of the cash-machine, and the refrain of the chorus-girl. 
The telegraph-operator murmured the word as she 
took down the letters of the various messages, the 
schoolmistress whispered it as she gave out the 
morrow's lesson in arithmetic, the female book- 
keeper uttered it while she added up the long column 
of figures. Even the little sub-editress, earning a 
salary of £ I a week for stealing copy from the daily 
journals, seemed imbued with that so-called " spirit 
of independence." " Give me my liberty and inde- 
pendence ! " That was the burden of their song. 
Some of them belonged to " The Independent 
Young Ladies' League," some to a "Liberty Club," 
others to "The Society for Promoting the Equality 
of Classes," and the rest were members of various 
societies and orders with similar names, while all 
prated of liberty and freedom like Young America 
just let loose. 

Their ideas seemed to be vague and wandering, 
and the majority of them were hardly able to give a 
proper definition of the word they used so glibly. 



In Cap and Apron. 5 

They were not a cheerful lot of girls by any means. 
Indeed, their solitary happiness was apparently in the 
belief that they were independent. Some of them 
were what are generally termed " ladies by birth," 
others were ladies by education. Each individual 
girl rejoiced in the appellation " young lady," whether 
she were a visiting governess or a clerk in a tobacco 
shop. They worked early and late at their profes- 
sions and trades, and their salaries varied from 6s. 
to 30s. a week. They supported themselves, and 
often had several younger brothers and sisters de- 
pendent upon them. Week after week, month after 
month, and year after year, they had toiled with little 
advancement or encouragement Most of them 
belonged to the commonplace order, neither clever 
nor stupid, only ordinary, everyday young women, 
working for their living. 

Many were hungry, some were badly clothed, few 
had comfortable beds or clean lodgings. A number 
of them had porridge for breakfast and watercress for 
supper, with no midday meal. One young woman 
assured me that boiled rice was her perpetual diet, 
and that, while it was filling, it became tiresome in 
the long run. But, despite these numerous incon- 
veniences, they were all "independent" girls, every 
one of them. Several times I broached the subject 
of domestic service as a possible release from their 
troubles, but they laughed me to scorn and flaunted 
the flag of liberty in my face. What ! go to service ? 
Not they ! Why, they could only have one night off 
each week, and no followers. Besides, who could 
wear caps and aprons without despising herself ? 

I began to wonder if there really could be any- 



6 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

thing terrible connected with domestic service which 
should make these poor girls so shrink from it. For 
myself, I knew little or nothing about housework, 
but the belief that there was nothing incompatible 
between gentility and domestic work had always been 
a hobby of mine. Why could not a refined English 
girl wash dishes, make beds, and roast a leg of 
mutton just as well as a member of the lower classes ? 
Wherein would she demean herself by doing this 
work and receiving wages for the same ? 

But there were the caps and aprons. Could an 
educated girl wear them without diminishing her 
self-respect ? Why was not a housemaid's cap just 
as respectable as that worn by a " lady nurse" ? For 
my own part, I had always insisted that no Paris 
milliner could manufacture any headgear more 
becoming to the majority of women than the white 
ruffled cap of the domestic servant employed by 
members of the upper classes. A pretty maid, to my 
mind, was much prettier with a cap than without one, 
while the face of an ugly girl was also improved by it. 
But these " slavery badges," I was told, were not the 
only bugbears of the servant-girl. 

I had a curiosity to find out just what these trials 
were, and to discover why this service was looked 
upon with so much contumely. As a mistress, how- 
ever kind and considerate I might be, it was im- 
possible for me to get a perfect understanding of the 
inner working of the household machinery. There 
was only one way to get at the root of the matter, 
and that was to go out to service myself. 

I arrived at this decision one morning in the 
latter part of August, and I no sooner decided than I 



In Cap and Apron. 7 

began to make preparations for my campaign. I 
first purchased some goods for a print dress, which I 
had made up in the prevailing style for housemaids, 
together with a black serge gown for afternoon wear. 
Then I bought three linen aprons for morning, and 
as many fine muslin ones for dress-up occasions. 
They were prettily trimmed with embroidery, and 
the ruffled epaulettes were a joy to behold. Cuffs and 
collars and caps with long streamers completed my 
outfit. Then I hired a room in Camberwell for 2s. 6d. 
a week, where I might have letters addressed, and 
arrangements were made with a titled friend to give 
me a reference as to respectability and honesty. 

Until all these details were settled, I gave little 
thought as to how I should get the situation I desired, 
nor the difficulties I should be likely to encounter. I 
had a nineteenth-century woman's confidence in my 
ability to accomplish whatever I should set out to do, 
and the remembrance of my first and only attempt 
at sweeping a floor (which left me with blistered 
hands) did not in the least daunt my spirit. I should 
never have been tempted to call myself a domestic- 
ated woman, and my experiences in household duties, 
so far as the actual work might be concerned, was 
very limited ; yet I prided myself upon my abilities 
in the "knowing how" line. If I had never washed 
dishes, I knew how they ought to be done ; and I 
was thoroughly convinced that dish-washing, sweep- 
ing, dusting, making beds, and "turning out" rooms, 
could be reduced — or, rather, elevated— to a science. 
I felt sure that in all kinds of work there were hard 
methods and easy ones. By going out to service I 
should discover which was which, and then I should 



& Campaigns of Curiosity. 

be able to write a series of articles on " Housework 
Made Easy," thus benefiting womankind in general 
and servant-girls in particular. 

In order to inform myself as to just where my 
valuable services were required, I picked up the 
morning paper and looked among the " Situations 
Vacant." 



WANTED. — Housemaid where Parlourmaid 
is kept ; must be neat, of good appearance, tall, 
and thoroughly capable, with at least twelve months' 
character. 



It was evident that I would not suit that adver- 
tiser, for I was not tall, neither was I possessed of a 
twelve-months' character. I proceeded down the 
column, and to my utter dismay I found that length 
of body, as well as length of character, was considered 
indispensable in a housemaid or parlourmaid. There 
were several places open to " generals," but most of 
them were required to look after the babies, besides 
doing the other work, and I felt unequal to the task. 
Cooks were in great demand, but they also must 
needs have long characters. 

Still, I did not lose heart, but bearing in mind the 
motto of the Americans, " Trust in the Lord and 
advertise," I wrote out an advertisement and took it 
to a newspaper office in Fleet Street. As I handed 
it to the receiving clerk, I observed that a puzzled 
look overspread his features. My notice was appar- 
ently something of a novelty to him, for, after re- 
reading it, he took it across the room to another clerk, 
who, when he had read it, smiled, and said, " It's all 
right. Put it in." The next morning— August 23rd 



In Cap and Apron. g 

— there appeared in the columns of "Situations 
Wanted" the following: — 

AS Housemaid, Parlourmaid, or House- 
Parlourmaid. — A refined and educated young 
woman, obliged to earn her living, and unable to find 
other employment, wants situation as above. Expects 
only such treatment as is given to servants. Will wear 
caps and aprons, but would not wish to share bed with 
another. Thoroughly reliable and competent. Refer- 
ences ; town or country. Wages, ^14. — Address — ». 



CHAPTER II. 

SEEKING A SITUATION. 



The day after my advertisement appeared I received 
159 letters and postcards in reply. This was en- 
couraging, for it proved conclusively that the demand 
for good servants was much greater than the supply, 
and also that there could not be any firmly-rooted 
objection to educated domestic help. Several of the 
writers wanted " lady-helps " and assured me that I 
should have nothing to do in the way of " menial 
service." A Southampton lady required a thoroughly 
educated young person for children, and said she had 
been advertising for a lady nurse. But it was not 
my object to go out as a lady-help, or a nurse. 
I wished a situation as an ordinary servant. 
One inquisitive person demanded to know my 
age, height, position in life, my father's business, if 
my mother was a gentlewoman, and whether I was a 
Churchwoman or a Dissenter — most of which in- 
formation seemed to me not at all relevant to the 
subject in hand. An old lady of seventy wanted 



io Campaigns of Curiosity, 

someone nice and quiet, with a restful appearance, 
for a parlourmaid, because she had rheumatism so 
badly and would like her knees rubbed. A lodging- 
house keeper was in need of a young woman who 
would study her interest, and answer board and 
residence advertisements in the papers. One of the 
latter class wrote : 

" Seeing your advertisement in the morning paper, 
wanting a home and friendship of a friend, I want a 
young person to assist me in the up-stairs duties of a 
first-class lodging-house, to look after and see and 
do all that is necessary, and take entire care and 
responsibility of the same. You would have to wear 
caps and aprons of course, when anyone was in the 
house, but not otherwise ; and I would do anything 
for your comfort if only you would study me. I 
have a young daughter of my own, but she prefers 
to go to business, and will not work in the house, 
and I want you to take her place." 

All this was very flattering, and showed the esteem 
in which the lady held me ; but I felt that the entire 
care and responsibility of a lodging-house, besides 
the duty of being a daughter to anybody, would be 
too great a weight on my shoulders. 

Another writer assured me that I should find her 
a considerate mistress, and said that she had always 
been told that she spoiled her maids by considering 
them too much, which, she began to think, was true. 
Many offered higher wages than those I had asked 
for, and a few thought my terms too high, on account 
of my probable inexperience. A young matron at 
Clapham Common was sure I should suit her. I 
would have the house-work to do and must mind a 



Tn Cap and Apron. ii 

five-months' baby. If I was a nice person, I would be 
happy in the situation. She could not give over £\2. 
The number of women with babies to mind seemed 
very numerous. The wife of a colonel wished to know 
if I would do the pocket-handkerchiefs and stockings 
each week for herself and three daughters, besides 
attending to the known duties of a house-parlourmaid. 
Somehow, I was convinced that this was more than I 
ought to undertake. Mrs. Black, of Hyde Park Gate, 
required a housemaid who must be a good dress- 
maker. She requested my photo with full particulars. 
No agent need apply. Windows and a little washing 
to be done. (Did Mrs. Black forget that there is a 
law against allowing women-servants to wash win- 
dows ?) Mrs. Smith, living near Oxford Circus, 
wanted a trustworthy, reliable, clean girl to do the 
work of a private house. She had a domesticated 
daughter, three sons and a husband, and would want 
the washing done at home. Wages £\o, or £\2 with 
no beer. Just where the clothes would be dried after 
the washing was done at home was a source of con- 
jecture in my mind, and I doubted my ability to put 
a proper gloss on the shirt-fronts of the three sons 
and the husband. 

Kind and thoughtful letters were numerous. Mrs 
Burns, living in a flat near Portland Place, wrote that 
she desired a house-parlourmaid who, in conjunction 
with the cook, would do the work of the flat. I 
could have a separate bedroom, and she would do 
everything in her power to make me feel that I was 
not without friends and home. A very nice letter 
came from Thames Ditton, which ended by saying 
" If you think my situation at all what you are 



12 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

seeking, will you give me some references ? and, as I 
am a stranger to you, I will send references in re- 
turn." This was the only instance in which the 
employer spoke of giving references, although I was 
always required to furnish them. Just why a " char- 
acter" should be demanded on one side only is 
beyond my comprehension. Why should not the 
give-and-take plan be followed in such cases ? Is not 
a mistress likely to prove as unmanageable as a 
servant ? 

An enterprising City man wrote that he was 
looking out for a young lady who would invest 
capital to build up a toy trade in a neighbourhood 
where there was no opposition. He would be pleased 
to hear if I was disposed to come to terms. Then I 
opened a letter couched in this language : — 

Dear Miss, — Seeing your advertisement, I am moved to write and 
say that I admire your pluck and am glad to know there is at least one 
young woman with sense enough to see that there is no disgrace in 
domestic labour. I would like to marry a girl like you, if you are not 
too old or ugly, which I do not believe you are. Please state age, 
complexion, height, temperament, and personal appearance, and tell 
me if you would accept for a husband an honest mechanic, aged 28, 
and earning £200 a year. If so, give me your address, and I will 
come and see you with all honourable intentions. It is much better 
for a girl like you to be married and have a protector than to be a 
housemaid. 

In my opinion, the writer of that epistle is a prize 
in the matrimonial market, and I should be glad 
to give his name and address to any young woman 
who can answer his requirements and thinks she 
would be able to appreciate the situation. 

There were several replies from bachelors and 
widowers wanting " companion-working-lady-house- 



In Cap and Apron. 13 

keepers." They all assured me that there was very 
little work to be done. Mr. Alexander Macfarlane, 
of Glasgow, wished for particulars in regard to age, 
experience, and qualifications for his situation as 
house-parlourmaid. He stated that he was a single 
gentleman, whose establishment consisted of cook- 
housekeeper, kitchenmaid, and house-parlourmaid — 
all English. Each servant had a separate room. He 
desired to know if I had any experience in valeting, 
if I understood lamps, and how my knowledge of 
silver-cleaning and waiting at table had been gained. 
I must give particulars as to last two situations, and 
reasons for leaving them. What allowance would I 
require in addition to wages for finding myself in beer, 
tea, sugar, and washing? He requested my photo- 
graph, which he would return at once, and, if appear- 
ance and qualifications were satisfactory, he would 
arrange for an interview. 

In spite of Mr. Macfarlane's insinuation that I 
might need an extra allowance for beer-money, I 
conceived the greatest admiration for him, because 
he was the only man who took me at my word, and 
offered me a place as a regular servant. In reply, I 
wrote him some particulars, stating that I was a tee- 
totaller, had never been out to service, and could only 
give reference as regarded my respectability and 
honesty, but felt competent to undertake the work 
he mentioned, including the valeting. His answer 
was straightforward. He feared that a young woman 
of my bringing up and education would not find it 
pleasant to work in his house under the supervision 
of a cook-housekeeper. It would be better for me to 
go in a small family where there was a lady at the 



14 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

head of the household. If he heard of any place he 
thought suitable for me, he would write immediately, 
as he felt interested in me and desired to help me. 

Would that there were more Alexander Macfarlanes 
in the world ! 

About half the letters contained stamps for reply, 
and I conscientiously wrote to every person who en- 
closed a stamp. The story I told of my circum- 
stances was a simple one and as near the truth as 
I thought politic to make it. I was an orphan and 
almost alone in London, well educated, but my edu- 
cation was such as did not fit me for anything in 
particular. I could not obtain employment in the 
City, as I did not write a good hand, and, not under- 
standing the languages or music, found it difficult to 
get a position as governess. Nothing was left me 
but domestic work, which I understood perfectly. I 
thought it no disgrace to be in service, and had deter- 
mined to get a place as housemaid or parlourmaid, 
asking no favours and desiring only wages for services 
rendered. I gave the Camberwell address, and signed 
my letters Elizabeth Barrows. In some cases I re- 
ceived no answers, but about fifty appointments were 
made for me to call in various parts of London. Mrs. 
Clifford-Morris, who was spending a few weeks in 
Brighton, asked me to call on her husband, a solicitor, 
in Chancery Lane, who could then give her particulars 
in regard to me. She thought she could employ me 
as useful help in her flat when she returned home. In 
her several letters she addressed me as "My dear 
Miss Barrows," and the sympathetic, delicate manner 
in which she treated me quite won my heart. I did 
not call on Mr. Clifford-Morris, as I felt that to enter 



In Cap and Apron. 15 

the service of his wife, knowing that I should remain 
only a short time, might put her to inconvenience 
in her household arrangements for the winter and 
be but small return for her kindness to me. Yet 
I determined to try to find her such a person as she 
wanted, and I still hope that I may be able to send 
her someone who would appreciate the home she 
has to offer. 

On the morning of Friday, September I, I started 
out in answer to some of the appointments made 
for that day. My first call was on a Miss Martin, 
who was at the head of what she described as a 
" high-class private hotel " in Mayfair. The man- 
servant who admitted me, asked me into the drawing- 
room, but, realising that henceforth I could no longer 
lay claim to the title of "young lady," but must 
consider myself only in the light of a "young person," 
I thought perhaps it would be better for me to remain 
in the hall, so I sat down on the hat-rack in orthodox 
servant-girl fashion, and tried to compose myself for 
the interview. Miss Martin, a pleasant-faced spinster 
of about forty, soon made her appearance, and asked 
me up to the drawing-room. She led me to a win- 
dow, looked me over, and then shook her head, kindly 
but firmly. 

" My dear, you are too little ! " was her first 
exclamation. 

" But I am strong, neat, willing, respectable, &c." 
I insisted. "Please do not despise me because I am 
small.'* 

Miss Martin still looked doubtful ; then she com- 
menced to tell me of all the work a housemaid would 
be expected to do, and afterwards showed me through 



16 Campaigns of Curiosity, 

the house, with a view of discouraging me. I felt 
that I must say something to convince her of my 
capabilities, so I ventured to suggest that I could 
dust the chairs in a much better way than they 
had been done, and explained to her a new and 
improved method of making beds. I also informed 
her that I was able to remove the numerous candle- 
grease spots with which the carpets were sprinkled, 
by the application of brown paper and a hot flat-iron 
to the injured parts. Miss Martin's face began to 
light up, and I could see I was making an impression. 
I went on and discussed learnedly the proper way to 
polish looking-glasses and shine the tiled fireplaces, 
while her enthusiasm increased. When I was leaving 
I gave her the name of my reference, and she pro- 
mised to write me her decision. What was my 
disappointment that evening to receive a letter saying 
she had not written to the reference as she could not 
help thinking I was too small and delicate to do the 
work ! It seemed that, as soon as my inspiring 
presence had vanished, she remembered only my 
diminutive stature. 

From Mayfair I went to Grosvenor Square, and 
met a most formidable-looking lady of the house. 
She did not ask me to sit down, but commenced at 
once to read me off a list of the duties to be performed 
by the parlourmaid, when, suddenly giving me a very 
scrutinising look, she advanced towards me, and lifting 
her hand warningly, ejaculated, " No fringe allowed !" 
I sprang back, and instinctively put my hand to my 
forehead as a protection, fearing she might brandish 
a pair of scissors before me and barber me then and 
there. What ! put back my fringe I I had entirely 



In Cap and Apron. 



17 



overlooked the fact that many servants were not 
allowed to wear a fringe. 

" I couldn't part with it, ma'am," I answered in 
humble and trembling accents. Then I made a 
frightened retreat, and walked in the direction of 




NO FRINGE ALLOWED ! " 



Regent's Park. No fringe, indeed ! Was it possible 
that one of my own sex could be so cruel as to wish 
to deprive me of my halo ? Besides, my caps were 
not becoming without a fringe. Liberty ! Indepen- 
dence ! I began more fully to understand the meaning 
of the words, and I wondered if, after all, I should 
not end by joining " The Independent Young Ladies' 
League." 

I rang the bell of a large house in Marylebone 
Road, and was admitted to the presence of Mrs. 
C 



1 8 Campaigns of Curiosity, 

Green, who had wired me to call that morning. She 
was an elderly woman, tall and stately, with a kind 
face which quite reassured me. She asked me to sit 
down and then to stand up. 

" I am afraid you will not do. You are so short 
You see, a parlourmaid must have long arms in 
order to reach things on the table, and a housemaid 
should also be tall ; else how can she put the linen 
away on the top shelves and wash the looking-glasses 
in the drawing-room ? Why do you not try to 
get a place as nurserymaid or governess to small 
children ? " 

I did not feel at liberty to say just why I did 
not do this. I only said that I knew so little about 
children that I was afraid to undertake so great a 
responsibility. 

"Well," said she, "you would not suit for my 
house — the work is too hard for you — yet I must try 
to help you. It is so sad for a girl to be alone in 
this great city. I was just eating my luncheon. 
Will you have a nice chop and cup of tea ? In the 
meantime I will see what I can do for you." 

I was not hungry, but I went with her to the 
dining-room while she finished her meal, and answered 
as truthfully as I could the questions she put con- 
cerning myself. 

" Can you sew ? " she asked. 

My thoughts turned involuntarily to the many 
times I had tried to learn the art of needlework, 
which had resulted only in pricked fingers and a 
bad temper. Once I remembered to have been able 
to get through a little patchwork. Dared I say that 
I could sew ? Then I answered, " Yes, ma'am, a 



In Cap and Apron. 19 

little," inwardly praying that she might never dis- 
cover how very little that " little " was. She went to 
her desk, wrote a note, and handed it to me sealed. 
" This is a letter to a friend of mine in South Ken- 
sington, a lady who keeps a high-class employment 
agency. Go to her this afternoon, and she may be 
able to get you more congenial work than that of an 
ordinary servant. Take the Underground. Here is 
your fare." 

To my horror she slipped a half-crown piece into 
my hand. I protested that I had a little money, and 
could not think of taking it, but she insisted, and I 
felt I could not refuse it without exciting her sus- 
picion. " Good-bye. Write me how you get along. 
I shall always be interested in you," and with a 
motherly pat on the head she dismissed me. I 
wandered along Marylebone Road with the letter 
and the money, feeling like a culprit. Might I not 
be arrested on the charge of obtaining money under 
false pretences? Would the excuse that I was a 
journalist, doing evil that good might come, protect 
me from the law ? The coin almost burned a hole 
into my glove. Just then a woman, grinding a small 
organ, passed me, and I thrust the money into her 
hand and rushed away before she could overwhelm 
me with thanks. I broke the seal of the letter, and 
read : — 

Dear Mrs. , — The bearer interests me. Her case seems a 

sad one. Can you advise her how to get work ? I know you won't 
mind the trouble of doing anyone a kindness. She seems so forlorn, 
alone in a large city. 

God forbid that I should ever grow pessimistic, 
and think womankind cold and heartless, when such 
C 2 



20 Campaigns of Curiosity, 

women as Mrs. Green live in the world ! Surely, 
future generations of working girls will rise up to call 
her blessed ! 

I spent a week in my search for a situation. 
Among the people I met, a Thackeray or a Dickens 
would have found abundant material for many 
characters in many books. I called on bachelors, 
widowers and widows, ladies of title, members of 
the upper and middle classes, actresses, literary 
women, and boarding-house keepers. They all 
agreed that it was the proper thing for educated girls 
to go out to service, and that a great change must be 
brought about in the class of domestics to be em- 
ployed. However, the majority of them found some 
objection to giving me a trial. A woman on Cam- 
bridge Terrace offered me a place as parlourmaid in 
a house where twenty lodgers were taken, and I 
would have accepted it but for the fear that at the 
end of the week's trial she was to give me I would 
be too much reduced in flesh and spirit to linger long 
on the earth, for each of the twenty lodgers must 
have his or her meals carried up-stairs on a tray. 
Another boarding-house keeper was so sorry I had 
not ;£ioo to invest in the business, as she would have 
liked to have taken me into partnership. In Glouces- 
ter Road a Mrs. Weldon, living in a small house, 
with only herself and husband in family, said she 
liked my appearance and manner, but that I did not 
give her enough particulars concerning my private 
history and family affairs. I thought her suspicious 
manner of treating me far from delicate, especially 
as I gaye her the name of a well-known London lady 
as reference, who, I informed her, had known me 



In Cap and Apron. 21 

from childhood. Had I been an ordinary applicant 
for a situation, I should have attempted to give her a 
lesson in politeness and considerateness for the feelings 
of others. It is neither consistent nor just that a 
young woman applying for a place as servant should 
be subjected to such a catechism as that through 
which this woman put me. It is quite as honourable 
for servants to listen at keyholes as for mistresses to 
attempt this prying into personal secrets. 

At last I found an engagement. Mrs. Allison, 
residing in a large house in the neighbourhood of 
Portman Square, wrote to inform me that my refer- 
ence was satisfactory, and she would give me a place 
as housemaid. She ended by saying — 

" I think I shall be able to smooth over many 
of the rough places for you, and give you a comfort- 
able home." 

She would expect me on the evening of September 
14. During the interval I made a close study of a 
little book entitled " Servants' Duties ' and endeav- 
oured to make myself proficient in all that pertained 
to my chosen work. I became quite an expert in 
the use of the words "ma'am" and "sir." At the 
appointed time I presented myself and my handbag 
at the door of the Portman Square mansion, ready to 
enter my first situation as housemaid. 



CHAPTER I'll. 

"ELIZABETH BARROWS," HOUSEMAID. 

My ring at Mrs. Allison's door-bell was answered by 
the parlourmaid, who, without any explanations on 



22 Campaigns op Curiosity. 

my part, seemed at once to recognise me as a co- 
labourer, and led me to the servants' room on the fifth 
floor. I was immediately struck with the cheerless 
and comfortless aspect of the place where I was to 
sleep and, perchance, to dream for a week or longer. 
Three iron bedsteads stood in a row, and in front of 
each was a strip of ragged carpet. There were two 
chairs, a green chest of drawers, with a rickety- 
looking-glass on top, and two green washstands, with 
two bowls and pitchers. When I saw these latter 
articles, it occurred to me that I had been told three 
servants were to occupy the room, and I began to 
wonder whether I would be obliged to share my 
washbasin with the cook or the parlourmaid. I did 
not like the prospect of such a contingency, and I was 
far from being convinced of the truth of the saying 
that " whatever is, is right." Still, I was philosophical 
enough to understand that, whatever must be, must 
be, and I commenced to unpack my few belongings. 
Annie, the parlourmaid, had indicated the drawer in 
the green chest which was to be my individual pro- 
perty, so I put away my caps, aprons, collars, cuffs, 
and the blue print dress I was to don the next 
morning. Over the mantel hung a brightly-coloured 
motto. It read, " Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, 
do it with thy might." The verse was very a propos 
and inspired fresh courage in my trembling heart as 
I tied on my prettiest apron and went to the glass to 
adjust my cap. Then, after a final satisfactory glance 
into the mirror, I descended to Mrs. Allison's sitting- 
room on the second floor. I found that lady dusting 
the various ornaments on her writing-desk with a 
yellow silk duster. 



In Cap and Apron. 23 

She smiled propitiously upon me, and said, 
"Good-evening, Elizabeth. Go right down to 
the kitchen. Annie will tell you about the 
work." 

" Yes, ma'am," I replied ; " but please call me Lizzie 
I like it better." 

* Very well, Lizzie." 

That was the extent of our conversation. Mrs. 
Allison had no words to waste on her servants. 
Indeed, I was glad of it. When I had first called on 
her, she listened respectfully to the story I had to tell, 
took its truthfulness for granted, and said she would 
do the same thing in my circumstances. She asked 
no unnecessary questions, and I was prepared to like 
her because she had not attempted to pry into my 
family secrets nor to deprive me of my fringe. I had 
explained to her that, although I might be above the 
ordinary servant in education and bringing up, I did 
not wish it to make any difference in her treatment of 
me. In this matter she had respected my wishes, 
and I felt that I was in a fair way to find out just 
what were her relations with the young women who 
were employed in her household in the capacity ot 
domestic helps. 

In the kitchen I found Annie standing before the 
fire grilling mutton chops. She explained that a new 
cook would be there the following Monday, and that 
she was to prepare the meals until then. Eyeing me 
critically, she exclaimed, " Did she tell you to wear 
caps with streamers ? " I guessed that " she " referred 
to the mistress of the house, and informed her that I 
was wearing streamers on my own responsibility. 
She thought my style was much prettier than her 



^4 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

own French caps, and declared her intention of pur- 
chasing some like mine. 

" Been out to service before ? " was her next 
inquiry. 

" No ; this is my first place." 

"You'll find it's not -so easy as it looks," she 
remarked, with a very superior and knowing air. 
" We're on board wages till the cook Comes," she con- 
tinued. " There's your allowance on the shelf." 

I remembered that at home some of our own 
servants had often referred enthusiastically to certain 
times when they had been put on board wages and the 
money they had been able to lay by at the end of the 
week. I walked with elastic steps towards the shelf 
to which Annie pointed, and picked up is. 6d. Then 
my hopes went down about 90 degrees in the shade. 

" Is this to buy breakfast ? " I asked. 

Annie tittered. 

" Well, I should say it was to buy breakfast, dinner, 
supper, and afternoon tea," was her announcement. 

Who would have believed it ? To be sure, I had 
never sat down and calculated to a nicety just the quan- 
tity of eatables is. 6d. would buy ; but still I doubted 
my ability to make it go that far, especially when I 
learned that pepper, salt, mustard, vinegar, and sugar 
were also included in the meals. I began to have 
great respect for that is. 6d. 

I saw that Annie was inclined to be friendly, 
which was a source of great satisfaction to me, for I 
knew there must exist a spirit of camaraderie between 
myself and fellow-servants, else I should never be able 
to accomplish what I had set out to do — that is, dis- 
cover the ins and outs of domestic service. I was 




"ELIZABETH BARROWS, HOUSEMAID. 
(From a Photograph by the London Stereoscopic Company.) 



26 Campaigns of CuriositV. 

fully prepared to enter into the joys and sorrows of 
the kitchen, and with that in view I tried to be as 
agreeable as possible to Annie. She had noticed 
nothing peculiar about me, with the exception of 
streamers. If my manner of speech was different from 
hers, she did not observe it, but took me for one of her 
own kind. Annie's attitude toward me was not in 
any way intended to add to my self-conceit, and any 
intellectual bearing I might have thought I possessed 
did not apparently show up to advantage in the garb 
of cap and apron. 

Later in the evening we made the round of the 
rooms. Annie gave me explicit instructions as to how 
to tidy them up, turn down the beds and make the 
washstands ready for use. When this work was done, 
I was more tired than I had ever been in my life. 
What with emptying out the washbowls and refilling 
the pitchers, I had gone up and down two flights of 
stairs eight times, carrying heavy water-cans and pails. 
To the kitchen we again descended, and, while I wiped 
the dishes, Annie entertained me by telling me some- 
thing of the family with whom I was to live. There 
were Mr. and Mrs. Allison, three daughters, and two 
sons. Two of the young ladies were at the seaside, 
and would return with their maid on Saturday. The 
staff of servants included cook, parlourmaid, house- 
maid, and ladies' maid. Annie had formerly been 
housemaid in the family where she was now parlour- 
maid, so she was able to instruct me as to my duties. 
She opened a little cupboard off the kitchen and 
brought out a basket of underwear and stockings. 
It was the housemaid's basket, and I was to spend my 
evenings in attending to the mending. I looked 



In Cap and Apron. 2J 

aghast at the contents. How should I, with my slight 
knowledge of needlework, attempt to darn the woollen 
socks of the gentlemen of the house? Just then 
Annie was called to the hall to answer the whistle of 
the speaking-tube, and returned to say that Mrs. 
Allison would see me in the study and give me a list of 
the work I was to do the following day. I welcomed 
this news as a present deliverance from the mending pro- 
blem, but when I got that list from Mrs. Allison, I felt 
that my doom was sealed. It seemed to me that the 
responsibilitiesputupon myshoulders were tremendous. 
I was to rise at six in the morning, and my first 
duty was to shake and brush Mr. Allison's trousers, 
which I would find hanging on the doorknob out- 
side his room. I was about to inform Mrs. Allison 
that I did not engage as a valet, and was not 
up in the art of brushing trousers, when I suddenly 
remembered that I was not a " young lady " now, but 
a "young person," expected to do with her might 
whatever her hands found to do. Did not the motto 
in my bedroom so inform me ? I made no remarks, 
and listened for the second duty, which was to brush 
Mrs. Allison's dress and carry all the boots to the 
kitchen for Annie to polish. I was glad of the latter 
clause, for, had I been told to shine the boots, I think 
I should have despaired. Afterwards I would sweep 
and dust four flights of stairs and five halls, clean up 
and dust the study and drawing-rooms, and carry a 
can of hot water to each person, knocking on the door 
to wake him or her up. I concluded that when I 
had accomplished all these things, I should have done 
a good day's work ; but were my ears deceiving me ? 
What was Mrs. Allison saying ? 



2& Campaigns of Curiosity. 

" Then you may eat your breakfast ! " 

So I was to achieve all those Herculean feats on an 
empty stomach ! Well, if that was the case, I certainly 
ought to be able to perform wonders after I had 
breakfasted. 

Mrs. Allison continued with her list, never noting 
my perturbed countenance. 

" After you have breakfasted, Lizzie, you must 
help Annie with the dishes, then make the beds, 
clean up the washstands, fill the water-jugs, 
sweep and dust the bedrooms, attend to the 
candlesticks, and put everything in perfect order 
in the sitting-rooms. You will get this done by 
eleven o'clock." (On that point I was tempted to 
contradict her flatly, but I knew discretion was the 
better part of valour, and preserved silence.) " From 
eleven till three," went on my mistress, " you will turn 
out one or two of the rooms and eat your dinner in 
the meantime. At four o'clock I want you to be 
dressed with clean cap and apron. Then you will get 
the servants' afternoon tea and clear it away, and you 
can fill up the time until supper with needlework." 
(That needlework still relentlessly pursued me.) 
After supper I was to make the round of the rooms 
again and sew until a quarter-past ten. Then I might 
go to bed, a consummation devoutly to be wished for ! 

After hearing the " list," I bowed politely to Mrs. 
Allison, said, "Very well, ma'am," and joined Annie 
in the kitchen. She greeted me with a fiendish grin, 
and said, "Did she say anything about the scrubbing?" 

" Scrubbing ! Must I scrub ? " I almost shrieked. 

" You'll think so, when you get at it ! Why, you 
have to scrub a bedroom all over every day, and 



In Cap and Apron. 29 

sometimes two ! You see, you must turn out a room 
each day, and there's no carpet on the bedrooms ; 
only a narrow rug- before the bed. On turning out 
day, you must shake the rug and scrub up the floor 
and the paint. It do make your hands and arms ache, 
I tell you. It's too bad you took such a hard place 
for your first time in service ! " 

She said this rather pityingly. No wonder! I 
pitied myself. It was ten o'clock. 

" Come," said I, " let us go to bed. I'm so tired ! " 

Annie laughed. 

u Well, you're a greeny, sure enough ! When 
you're in service, you can't go to bed when you like. 
Master Tom is out, and hasn't a key. We'll have 
to let him in. You might do some needlework while 
we're waiting." 

That was the last straw that broke the camel's 
back. I put my head down on the kitchen table and 
silently wept. 

At eleven o'clock Master Tom came in, and we 
went to our bedroom. I noted that the bed had 
neither springs nor hair mattress, but I slept, never- 
theless, and all night long in my dreams came visions 
of much-worn scrubbing-brushes and basket upon 
basket of gentlemen's undarned socks. Suddenly I 
heard a loud noise like the clanking of a cow-bell. 
I jumped up, and went to Annie's bed to demand 
the meaning of the horrible racket. 

" Why, it's six o'clock ; that's all. The missus has 
an alarm-bell connected with her room. She sends 
it off every morning to make us get up." 

I was dressed in an instant, and with my written 
list in hand, started off to attend to order number 



30 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

one. The trousers and the dress were duly brushed, 
the stairs and halls swept and dusted, and each 
person supplied with a hot-water can. Then I went 
into the study, which was a large room. There were 
dozens of ornaments on the desk and mantel, which 
it seemed an endless task to dust and rearrange. 
My head ached for the want of food, yet I knew 
that I had not only the study to finish, but two large 
drawing-rooms to attend to. I noticed that the 
drawing rooms and the study were the only really 
cheerful rooms in the house. All the comforts and 
pictures and ornaments were crowded together in 
these rooms, and to do them up properly was no 
easy piece of work, but they were on the list to be 
done before breakfast. At 8.30 I had finished them, 
however, and went to the kitchen. 

Annie informed me that the servants' cupboard 
was in a veritable Mother Hubbard state, and, if I 
wanted anything for breakfast besides tea and bread, 
I must go and buy it. I took my is. 6d. and went 
out to shop, and, remembering that my own home 
was only a short distance from the place where I 
was " in service," I ran around there and filled my 
basket with provisions, while my is. 6d. remained 
intact. Annie's face beamed when she saw the 
wonderful purchases I had effected, all with is. 6d., 
and I then and there established the reputation of 
being a good provider. She insisted that she must 
share the expense, and wished to know the price of 
each article, which I gave her as follows : — One pound 
of strawberry jam (whole berries), 2d. per pound ; 
two pounds of best mutton chops, 6d.; three pounds 
of fresh tomatoes, 3d. for the lot ; four rashers best 



In Cap and Apron 31 

streaked bacon, Jd. per rasher ; large piece of beef 
for roasting, 5d. Annie declared she never knew 
you could buy things so cheap, and wanted the 
addresses of the shops I patronised. It is unnecessary 
to say that I had forgotten their location, and it is 
also needless to explain that from that time, until 
the cook came, I was delegated to do the marketing 
and hunt up these daily bargains, much to the 
diminishing of the contents of the larder at home. 
That morning we breakfasted off mutton chops and 
tomato sauce, while the family up-stairs were con- 
tent to start the day with one egg each and a slice 
of toast. 

That first day "in service" lingers in my memory 
as a sort of nightmare. The whole house seemed 
arranged in such a way as to make the work as 
hard as possible. The bath-room was on the top 
floor, and, as all the water must be carried from there 
to the bedrooms below, it was no small matter to 
fill the water-pitchers. Then, in washing, every 
member of the family seemed to have taken par- 
ticular pains to spill as much water about as possible, 
and everything had to be removed from the wash- 
stands before they could be put in order. All this 
might have been prevented had the bowls been filled 
not quite so full and a little care been exercised. 
Everything was thrown down where it had been 
used, though it was just as easy to return these 
various articles to their proper places. The linen 
cupboard in Mrs. Allison's room was guarded by an 
immense couch, on which were piled dozens of boxes 
containing dresses, which must all be removed before 
I could get fresh towels. Then the couch had to 



32 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

be pushed back again, and the boxes heaped on top. 
All the bedrooms were gloomy and devoid of com- 
fort, to say nothing of ornaments. The floors, as 
Annie had informed me, were not carpeted, and 
served to bring forcibly to my mind the scrubbing 
I should have to do. Eleven o'clock came, and I 
had not finished the bedroom work. There were all 
the candlesticks to scrape off. One of them, a hand- 
some bronze figure of Minerva, it took me just one 
hour to get clean. The armour, draperies, and petti- 
coats of the goddess were plentifully sprinkled with 
candle-grease, which soap and water failed to eradi- 
cate, so there was nothing to do but scrape it off 
with a hair-pin, all of which took much valuable 
time. " What, an hour spent in cleaning a candle- 
stick ! " some sensible housewife may exclaim. I 
can only tell her to get a bronze Minerva and see 
if she can do it in quicker time. 

At half-past one Annie and I were eating dinner, 
when a whistle sounded through the speaking-tube. 

" Yes, ma'am," I called, ready to take Mrs. Alli- 
son's order. 

" Lizzie, you did not close the schoolroom window. 
Come up and attend to it." 

I went to the schoolroom, on the top floor; it 
was five flights from the kitchen. The lady of the 
house sat at a table reading a magazine. I closed 
the window and went down to finish my dinner. 

This was an instance of the way Mrs. Allison tried 
to "smooth over the rough places" for me and make 
my situation as comfortable as possible. 



In Cap and Apron. 33 



CHAPTER IV. 

ROUGH PLACES "SMOOTHED OVER." 

When I had spent two days in Mrs. Allison's ser- 
vice, I began to wonder what the "rough places" 
would have been like had she not attempted to 
smooth them over. She certainly could not have 
accused me of being a slow worker, and I did not 
" dilly-dally " over my duties, yet on Friday and 
Saturday I found it impossible to make time for 
"turning out" the rooms, however much I hurried. 
I no sooner finished tidying up the bedrooms than 
the washbowls were again filled to overflowing with 
soapy water and needed further attention. When 
I had brushed one dress and hung it in the ward- 
robe, another flannel gown or coat would be hung 
out on the banisters. " Such little things ! " some- 
one may say. Yes, that is true. A dress may be 
brushed in five minutes, and a washbasin emptied 
and wiped out in less time, but these small things 
call a servant away from her more important work 
and put her behind for the whole day. On Saturday 
morning, when I was washing out the dusters in the 
housemaid's cupboard, Mrs. Allison presented me 
with a pair of her husband's old kid-gloves, saying 
they would be " nice to wear when brushing the grates." 
I uttered a silent prayer that the cold days might 
not come during my stay, and put them away for 
the use of my successor. The carrying of coals, 
D 



34 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

building of fires, and emptying ashes are doubtless 
the hardest part of the work which falls to the 
women servants in a house where no man is kept, 
especially in families where every member insists 
on being comfortable and having fires in the bed- 
rooms. However, Annie informed me that at Mrs. 
Allison's the bedrooms were not heated in the winter. 
Still, with each sleeping-room there was connected 
a sitting-room, where fires were kept, besides two 
grates in the drawing-rooms ; all of which work fell 
to the lot of the housemaid. 

I soon became accustomed to my work, and was 
really surprised at the readiness with which I put 
into practice all I learned from my little book on 
" Servants' Duties," and, although I knew my stay 
was only a temporary one, I interested myself to 
discover the easiest and quickest ways for doing the 
work. After sweeping the stairs the first morning, 
I found that the small banister brush used for that 
purpose in most London houses was not a convenient 
or suitable implement, as it was impossible to get 
into the corners with it, so it was necessary to use 
two brushes in the operation. I felt sure that a 
whisk broom would better meet my requirements, 
and requested Mrs. Allison to get me one ; but she 
was not inclined to give any help in the way of 
labour-saving appliances, so I used my own little 
broom which I had taken with me for brushing my 
coat. After that the corners were beautifully clean. 
I would recommend this sort of brush to all house- 
keepers, not only because of its easy application to 
the corners, but for the reason that there is no 
awkward, heavy piece of wood about it, making that 



In Cap and Apron. 35 

disagreeable knockety-knock every time a step is 
brushed, thus saving wear and tear on the nerves 
of the housemaid and allowing the members of the 
family to continue their morning sleep undisturbed 
by the racket. In the same way, for sweeping both 
bare floors and carpets, the long-handled straight 
broom, known as the " American broom," seems 
to me to be ever so much more convenient and 
easy to manipulate than the English brush broom, 
which } like the banister broom, will not go into the 
corners. 

All the stairs of the house were covered with felt, 
the hardest floor-covering in the world to keep clean. 
Besides the daily sweeping, I was obliged to rub them 
frequently with a damp cloth in order to remove the 
accumulated dust and lint. The halls and passages 
were of stone, with rugs scattered about, which proved 
to be perfect traps for dust and dirt, and showed con- 
clusively that properly carpeted halls were, in the 
long run, a great saving of labour. There were gas- 
pipes in every room, needing only the addition of 
fixtures to make them ready for use, and thus 
dispense with the numerous candlesticks that were 
to be refilled every day. In the halls, on the stairs, 
and in every room of the house, from the kitchen to 
the fifth floor, candle-grease was plentifully sprinkled, 
and my brown paper and hot flat-iron were in con- 
stant demand. 

It seemed to me that, by expending a little 
thought and money, a vast amount of unnecessary 
time might be saved as regarded the continual tidying 
up of bedrooms, &c. For instance, why should beds 
first be made up with the blankets and coverlets over 
D 2 



36 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

the pillows, and then partly remade in the evening 
when the beds are " turned down " ? An easier and 
much neater way would be to turn down the sheets at 
once and place the pillows on the outside. Thus only 
one handling is necessary. 

If mistresses would devote more thought to this 
saving of labour, they would find they were at the 
same time lessening their household expenses by 
preventing an unnecessary outlay in servants' wages, 
for where work is made light, and quick methods 
employed, fewer servants are required. 

On Saturday a charwoman came in to help make 
things ready for the new cook. She was a type of 
the charing sisterhood — big, red-faced, and noisy, with 
a tendency to order about the servants of the house. 
She scrubbed and scoured up everything in the 
basement, yet always stopped just short of finishing 
what she began. Every stewpan and pot received a 
rub and a dig with a knife, and was put back on the 
shelf with some of last year's grease or soot on it. 
To make things clean on the outside as well as on the 
inside seemed never to enter her head. The immense 
spit used for roasting was brought out, and by its 
looks I judged that the old cook had never troubled 
herself to wash it during the last six months. It was 
subjected to the process of scraping and pounding, 
which was enough to render it utterly useless ever 
after. It, too, was put back in the scullery, clean in 
spots. 

That scullery ! What a revelation it was to me, 
and how I resolved that when I got out I would 
use my influence to abolish sculleries for ever ! I 
know that the majority of cooks insist upon having 



In Cap and Apron. 37 

what they call a " place for doing the dirty work," but 
why should there be this dirty work, if things are 
done properly each day ? To wash dishes and pots 
and kettles only hot water, plenty of soap and soda, 
and a dishcloth are necessary, and, if properly 
attended to after each meal, there is no reason why 
they should be put on the shelf with black soot 
sticking to them. I noticed that the charwoman and 
Annie seemed to have but one idea in their dish- 
washing — that of getting things put out of sight, no 
matter in what condition. When Annie brought the 
trays down from the dining-room, glasses, silver, 
knives, cups, meat- platters, and vegetable dishes were 
heaped together on the table in a miscellaneous mass, 
and, with the merest attempt at scraping and no 
effort to sort them, they were thrown into the water 
which was immediately covered with a scum of grease 
and tea or coffee grounds. I took advantage of an 
opportunity to put my scientific method of dish- 
washing into practice, but failed to make any 
impression on Annie's mind, for she returned to her 
old way at supper-time. I first put all the glasses 
together, then emptied everything from cups and 
saucers, and placed them in a neat pile. Then the 
spoons, knives and forks, plates, meat and vegetable 
dishes, were cleansed of leavings and grease, and 
put in other piles near the dishpan, while all 
pots and kettles were cleaned out as thoroughly as 
possible with a knife, and hot water poured into them 
to soak off the remainder while I washed the best 
dishes. 

These preliminary arrangements did not take 
more than five minutes, and then I was ready to 



38 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

proceed with dish-washing without the annoyance of 
greasy dish-water. The silver and glasses were 
washed and dried before I went on with the cups and 
plates, for I knew that, unless they were polished 
while they were hot, they would look smeared and 
dirty. I am aware that many servants insist on 
putting dishes away to dry on a rack, without 
applying a towel until they are ready to lay the 
table ; but I have never seen a clean and well- 
polished dish that was so handled. If dish-racks 
were abolished along with the sculleries, mistresses 
would find less reason to complain of the tables being 
laid with smeared and nicked dishes. Nothing can 
be more aggravating and unsightly than an expensive 
set of china with cracks and bits chipped off the 
edges ; and what little experience I had in the 
kitchen went to show me that ail this could be 
prevented if dishes were washed, dried, and put away 
immediately after each meal. 

Annie and I ate dinner on Saturday with the 
charwoman, who munched away at her bread and 
meat with her sleeves rolled up, exposing very fat, 
red arms. In the afternoon I was ordered to assist 
her in moving an iron bedstead from one room to 
another. She insisted that the bed could be pushed 
through the door without being taken apart, while I 
was of a different opinion. She did not look a pleasant 
person to cross, so I followed her instructions. The 
spirit was willing, but the flesh was weak, and, try 
as I would, I could not manage to lift the thing from 
the floor. 

"Come on there, Liz ! can't ye heft a bit?" she 
exclaimed impatiently. For the moment I forgot my 



In Cap and Apron 39 

cap and apron, and remembered only my outraged 
dignity and aching arms. Fortunately, ere I delivered 
myself of a scathing rebuke for her familiarity, a 
streamer flapped in my face, a timely reminder of my 
altered condition and circumstances. 

Thus the Allison family were spared the inter- 
esting scene of a combat between the housemaid and 
the charwoman. 

The bed finally had to be dismantled and taken 
apart, and the charwoman seemed to regard me as 
the cause of all the trouble. At tea-time she had 
somewhat relented, and offered to share her pitcher of 
bitter ale with me. (Mrs. Allison, I may mention, 
showed the good sense not to supply the servants 
with beer, and, if they drank it, it was at their own 
expense.) 

"Better take it, young woman," said she, as I 
refused the glass she pushed towards me. "Ye'll 
need a strengthener if yer housemaid in this place. 
I've chared here five years, and I know the housemaid 
they had before Annie came worked herself into the 
'ospital in less than a year's time. She's done for 
now, is Annie. Got housemaid's knee with all the 
scrubbing." 

I decided to investigate into the cause and cure of 
this ailment, and took out a small note-book I carried 
in my apron pocket, and wrote down a few shorthand 
notes. 

" What's them queer marks ?" asked Annie, edging 
around to my side of the table and looking over my 
shoulder. 

I explained that I was trying to learn stenography 
with a view to bettering my position in life later on. 



40 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

Annie smiled her approval of the project, and thought 
I should be able to earn as much as thirty shillings a 
week if I got a place. 

The area gate bell rang just then, and Annie 
begged me to answer it, because I had finished tea 
and she had not. I started out, and got half-way up 
the stairs, when, looking up, I saw our own butcher's 
boy holding out a joint for me to take into the 
kitchen. " Hello, another new 'un!" he observed, and 
then, fearing he would recognise and betray me, I 
bolted backwards and into the kitchen, explaining 
that I had hurt my foot, and asked Annie to get the 
meat. From that time I lived in terror of being; 
asked to go on hasty errands, when I would not have 
an opportunity to remove my cap and apron. It was 
not that I was ashamed of the badge, but simply 
that I did not care to be recognised in the guise 
by any friends or neighbours I might meet. I was 
always careful to wear my coat and hat when I posted 
the letters in the evening, much to the disgust of 
Annie, who insisted that I wasted too much time in 
" primping." 

Saturday night the missing members of the family 
came home with their luggage and their maid. The 
boxes were heaped in the front hall and partly un- 
packed there. Mrs. Allison said that Annie and I 
were to carry them up-stairs the next morning, and 
I lay awake half the night wondering how I should 
be able to manage it without breaking any bones. 
Sunday morning we were allowed a half-hour's extra 
sleep ; but, to my astonishment, Annie informed me 
that the same round of work must be done as on 
weekdays. The stairs and passages, bedrooms, sitting- 



In Cap and Apron. 41 

rooms, and drawing-rooms were to be swept and 
dusted, and I was busy until twelve o'clock as on 
former days. Then we had the various boxes to 
carry to the fourth floor, During the process Annie 
assured me that the weight seemed to be all at her 
end of the boxes, and I felt she had every reason 
to complain, though I tugged away with might and 
main. Women servants are not fitted for doing 
this sort of work, and in the case of families where 
no manservant is employed outside help should 
be brought in. 

The gentleman of the house stood by, and saw 
us carrying the boxes and heard me remark that the 
cabman should have attended to them the previous 
night, but he seemed to be unimpressionable. Annie 
informed me that the evening before she had been 
obliged to assist the cabman in getting them from the 
top of the four-wheeler. 

At two o'clock, as a meal for seven persons had 
to be cooked, Mrs. Allison asked me to wait at table 
while Annie stayed in the kitchen. I dressed in my 
very best for that auspicious occasion, for it was my 
debut as a waitress. Annie gave me instructions 
beforehand, so that everything went off very credit- 
ably. Only once did I pass things to the right of the 
individual instead of to the left. No dishes were 
broken and nothing spilled over. I stood back in the 
corner of the dining-room awaiting orders from the 
head of the table, and many times had difficulty in 
repressing a smile as I listened to the table-talk. The 
first thought that occurred to me as I carried the 
heavy iron trays up the stairs was, " Why do not 
housewives spend a few pounds and have lifts put in, 



42 Campaigns of Curiosity, 

connecting dining-room and kitchen, thus saving all 
this running up and down stairs ? " The trays were 
immense iron things that were in themselves very- 
heavy without the addition of china and eatables. 
There are light tin trays to be had that answer every 
purpose, and I almost felt like suggesting the fact to 
Mrs. Allison after dinner, but I remembered her 
refusal of the whisk broom and desisted. It was 
half-past four when the dishes were cleared away. 
I began to feel anxious about my Sunday afternoon 
off, for I had received a letter, forwarded from the 
Camberwell address, telling me to call on Mrs. 
Brownlow, in Kensington, at six o'clock Sunday, 
as she thought she could employ me as par- 
lourmaid. At five I asked permission to go out, 
which was granted. I found the Kensington lady a 
most charming person, and made arrangements to 
enter her service as parlourmaid the following Thurs- 
day evening, though how I should get rid of my 
present place I had not then decided. I was deter- 
mined to try at least two situations before giving my 
experiences to the public, and I began to feel that 
my story of Mrs. Allison would not be a pleasant one 
to relate. 

I returned at seven, and found Annie busily 
engaged in answering the door. It was Mrs. Allison's 
day at home. I helped to prepare the tea and cakes, 
later we served supper to the family, and at nine 
had our own bread and cheese. So this was a Sun- 
day in service. I had two hours' rest ; Annie had 
none! I remembered a command I had been taught 
in my youth which had to do with the keeping of the 
Sabbath, and said something about manservants and 



In Cap and Apron. 43 

maidservants. I am not a Sabbatarian, but I contend 
that in the name of reason, and on good general busi- 
ness principles, every man and woman should have 
one day's rest during the week, be it Sunday or some 
other day. The round of sweeping should be 
omitted on Sunday, only a light dinner prepared, 
and a part of the servants be allowed to spend 
most of the day in their rooms, in church, or in 
the park, according to their inclinations, and the 
servants who must remain on duty during Sunday 
should be given a resting day during the week. I 
know it is asserted that most mistresses give their 
maids a whole or half-holiday each week, but my 
investigations have led me to believe that this 
is often neglected, and, whether or not it is so, 
the Sunday duties should be made as light as 
possible. 

Monday evening the new cook made her appear- 
ance, and our board wages ceased. I did not do any 
marketing, thinking that henceforth we should be 
provided with suitable meals. For breakfast, Tues- 
day, bread and butter and coffee were placed on the 
table. 

" Is there no meat or potatoes ? " I questioned 
Annie. 

" No, the missus never allows us anything in the 
morning but bread and coffee." 

I was already tired with my morning's work, and, 
having been told I must " turn out " two rooms that 
day, I knew that, without a proper breakfast, I should 
not be able to get through. I would speak to Mrs. 
Allison about it. 

" Better not," said Annie ; " the last cook fried 



44 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

some fish for breakfast one morning, and she got 
notice." 

" Annie," I said, " I'm afraid this place is going to 
be too hard for me. I don't think I'll stop after my 
week is up." 

" But you can't leave without giving notice. If 
you do, she'll make you pay her a whole month's 
wages ; and, if she makes you go without giving notice, 
she must pay you a month's wages," explained my 
co-worker. 

"But suppose I do something she doesn't like 
and she discharges me ? " 

" Why, then, you'd have to go ; but she wouldn't 
give you a character." 

I went to Mrs. Allison's room and knocked at the 
door. 

"Mrs. Allison, do you not allow the servants any- 
thing for breakfast but bread and coffee ? I thought 
there must be some mistake," I said, as she opened 
the door. 

" No, it is not a mistake," was her reply. 

" But I must have a good breakfast or I simply 
cannot do the work, so I will go out and buy some 
meat myself." 

" Very well, do so," she answered as she shut the 
door. 

An hour later, I was making her bed, when she 
entered the room. 

" Lizzie, I have been thinking it over, and I have 
decided that you and I won't pull," was her announce- 
ment. 

"No, I don't think we will, Ma'am," I re- 
plied. 



In Cap and Apron. 45 

"Then, if you will wait until I get suited," she 
continued, "you may go." 

I told her I was sorry I could not accommodate 
her, but that I preferred to leave Thursday, and she 
went off in high dudgeon, saying that any common 
servant would show her mistress the courtesy to 
remain until she was suited. 

Thus it came to pass that I was discharged from 
my first place without a character because I, like 
Oliver Twist, had the audacity to "ask for more." 
But I had three more days to work for Mrs. Allison, 
and I looked forward to Thursday with fear and 
trembling. 



CHAPTER V. 

WITHOUT A "CHARACTER." 

When I informed Annie that I had been discharged, 
she exhibited the greatest concern, for to her mind 
my condition was a pathetic one. How should I get 
another place without the character Mrs. Allison 
would refuse to give ? She argued that it was always 
better to part friends, even with bad mistresses, for 
without a character no girl could get a situation. 

I made a note of this for future reference, and 
since I left service I have found it a useful bit of in- 
formation. If many much-tried but good-natured mis- 
tresses would only remind impertinent and neglectful 
maids that future situations depend upon present 
good behaviour, a great stride would be made toward 



46 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

a solution of the servant problem. On the other 
hand, the time will come when references will 
be demanded from the mistress as well as the 
maid. Then the Mrs. Allison type will not be so 
numerous. 

Poor Annie ! She was holding one hand to her 
head and another at her side, while she discussed this 
question, displaying her unselfish interest in my 
welfare. She had lost four hours of legitimate sleep 
the preceding night, but was up at six in the morning 
as usual. What wonder that she felt tired and ill ! 
I counselled her to go to bed and rest awhile. She 
looked at me again with the superior air she had 
worn on the evening of our first meeting. "When 
you're in service, you can't go to bed if you're ill," was 
her answer, as she carried the tray of silver and 
glasses into the pantry, and commenced her first day's 
work as bond-fide parlourmaid. She had only a 
servant-girl's headache, brought on by remaining 
awake till after one o'clock in order to open the door 
for the daughters of the house, who had been to the 
theatre ! " But how avoid such occasional contin- 
gencies ? Shall the young ladies be allowed a latch- 
key?" asks a horrified mother of grown-up daughters. 
Well, of course, to my unconventional mind, the 
latch-key would be the simplest way out of the 
difficulty; but I would suggest that it is the duty 
of the ladies' maid and not of the parlourmaid 
to wait up and serve supper after the theatre. 
The parlourmaid must rise early in the morning 
to begin her daily round of work, and therefore 
should be allowed to go to bed at a proper hour, 
while in the case of the ladies' maid it is, or should be, 



In Cap and Apron. 47 

different. If she is up late, she should be allowed to 
sleep later in the morning. Of course, in large estab- 
lishments of a dozen or more servants these matters 
are better arranged ; but in households like Mrs. 
Allison's, where the strictest economy is practised as 
regards the number of servants employed and the 
amount of wages paid, little or no attention is given 
to this important subject. 

Mathilde, the Swiss maid, was a person who well 
appreciated her own value and took advantage of her 
position. She was a competent dressmaker and hair- 
dresser, who, for reasons known only to herself, 
elected to give her services to the Allison family for 
the small stipend of ^20 a year. Realising that 
cheapness and competency rarely go together, Mrs. 
Allison knew that she would be unable to fill 
Mathilde's place at such a price, and decided it was 
best to humour that young woman's whims. Mathilde 
was of a sleepy nature, and could not be induced 
under any consideration to sit up after 10.30, so 
either Annie or I must remain down-stairs till all the 
family were in. It was Mathilde's duty to help me 
make the best beds, and while thus engaged I noticed 
that she had a patronising way of treating me. She 
was particularly inquisitive in regard to my previous 
life and occupation, and I told her a highly-entertain- 
ing story concerning myself. 

The new cook was a welcome acquisition in the 
kitchen. Annie was especially glad to have some of 
the responsibilities taken off her shoulders, and the do- 
mestic machinery began to run a little more smoothly. 
My labours, however, were in no way lightened, ex- 
cept that I had nothing more to do with dish-washing. 



48 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

Annie's duties were to rise at six o'clock, attend 
to the lamps, sweep and dust the large music-room, 
carry some boiling water to Mrs. Allison, lay the 
table, wait at all the meals, clear away and brush 
up afterwards, answer the door, and assist with the 
needlework. Her duties seemed neither so numerous 
nor so complex as my own, but when I explain 
that from half-past nine in the morning until eleven 
at night the bell rang on an average of every ten 
minutes it will be seen that her time was well 
occupied. 

Mary, the cook, was tall, fat, ruddy-faced and 
good-humoured, and seemed inclined to make me her 
especial protege. She expressed regret when I told 
her I was to leave the next Thursday, and gave me 
the address of a lady in Belgravia who she thought 
could offer me an easy place. At dinner she was 
greatly exercised over the news that neither beer nor 
beer-money was allowed in the kitchen, and blamed 
herself for her stupidity in forgetting to ask about so 
important a matter before she took the place. Beer, 
she declared, was essential to her health and happi- 
ness. Then she beamed upon me, and, handing me a 
pitcher, asked if I would run around the corner and 
get some bitter ale, as she could not leave the joint 
that was roasting before the fire. I did not wish 
to offend her, nor did I quite like the idea of going 
to a public-house ; but finally, as I stood there halting 
between two opinions, journalistic enterprise got the 
better of dignity. I threw on my hat and coat, and, 
with the despised pitcher in hand, made my exit 
from the area gate, determined to penetrate into the 
mysteries of the bar-room, 



In Cap and Apron 49 

As I entered there came an odour of to- 
bacco that nearly overwhelmed me, but I went for- 
ward to have my pitcher filled. There was over a 
score of men and women standing or sitting about 
on the long benches, drinking, smoking, and gossip- 
ing about what " she said," what " he said," and what 
" I said, sez I." Some of the men were in livery, and 
I was the only one of my sex without a cap and 
apron. A number of those present I recognised as 
servants in neighbouring families. They seemed in 
no hurry to return with their beer, and, judging by 
their hilarious state, many of them had been there 
some time, and various family secrets were divulged 
by one servant to another. I left the place with my 
pitcher of ale, which I tried to hide by means of a 
large morning paper and the cape of my coat. I had 
seen the result of allowing beer-money to servants, 
and I appreciated more keenly why so many of the 
letters I had received in answer to my advertisement 
had ended with the words " No beer." I found that 
the public-house was made a sort of rendezvous for 
the men and women servants of the neighbourhood, 
and housework lagged behind, while with pipe and 
beer they gossiped and dragged out family skeletons 
for the edification of their fellow-servants. 

This question of beer-money is a much more serious 
one than many housewives imagine. I am speaking 
now from a purely business standpoint, for I am not a 
distributor of temperance tracts nor a member of a 
prohibition union. I can see no reason why beer or 
beer-money should be demanded by servants as one 
of their lawful rights. If, when their day's work is 
done, a glass of ale will help to take away "that tired 
E 



50 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

feeling" with which they must necessarily be afflicted, 
I would not be the one to deprive them of their com- 
forter ; but I do insist that the mistress of the house 
should not be called upon to furnish the beverage, 
nor should they under any circumstances be allowed 
to go to the public house to procure it. A business 
man in the city is not expected to furnish a daily 
allowance of beer to each one of his clerks; and, if 
domestic service is to be raised to a proper standard, 
this matter of beer-allowance must be dispensed with. 

Mary was what is commonly called a plain cook 
— not a "professed" one, as she confidentially in- 
formed me ; and when I noticed her way of preparing 
potatoes I decided that she was a very plain cook 
indeed. Her only ideas seemed to be either to boil 
them and send them up whole, or sift them through 
a colander, from which they emerged in dirty, rice- 
like flakes. She added no milk, butter, pepper, or 
salt, and I began to feel sorry for the family who 
were obliged to eat them — to say nothing of my own 
personal longing for some of the sixteen delicious 
dishes into which I knew potatoes could be made. 
Mary began at once to save up all the drippings from 
the roasts, and did not heed my remark that drip- 
ping was good for frying. She demanded to know 
whether I wanted to rob her of her lawful perquisites. 
When the bone-man came around, I believe she was 
richer to the extent of sixpence, while Mrs. Allison 
was poorer by a much larger amount. 

I soon discovered that the cook had a prejudice 
against washing frying-pans, which, each time bacon 
or fish was cooked, were hung up in the scullery with 
the cold grease sticking to them, all in readiness for 



In Cap and Apron. 51 

the next time they were needed ; and it was only a 
matter of chance if the fish-pan was not used the next 
day for frying eggs. Another discovery I made was 
the reason why so many pieces of beautiful china 
soon get unsightly with the enamel all marked by an 
intricate network of dark cracks. It is done by 
putting the dishes into the oven or on the stove to 
heat before being taken up to the dining-room. This 
can be avoided by immersing the plates, meat- 
platters, and vegetable-dishes in very hot water and 
drying quickly just as they are ready to be sent up- 
stairs. The heat of the oven not only cracks them, 
but imparts a peculiar odour not likely to increase 
one's appetite at dinner. 

* After the cook came, the three beds in the ser- 
vants' room were occupied, and, to my immense 
relief, Annie and Mary shared one washbowl, and 
left me in solitary enjoyment of the other. When we 
went to bed sleep did not come so easily as it had at 
first, for an exchange of opinions on various subjects 
was the order of the first hour or longer. Mary was 
curious to know all about the personal characteristics 
of each member of the family ; but Annie was un- 
communicative, and told her, if she stopped long 
enough, she would find out for herself. I was treated 
as a sort of heroine, Mary praising me for my pluck 
in asking for better breakfasts, which she declared 
her own intention of doing soon, and Annie always 
bewailing my characterless state. Mrs. Allison had 
advertised for a new housemaid, and Annie regaled 
us with an interesting description of all the girls who 
applied for the situation. At last a housemaid was 
engaged to come in the next Saturday. 
E 2 



52 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

" Why does she not come Thursday, so Mrs. 
Allison will have someone to take my place at 
once ? " I asked. 

" Oh, a girl don't like to go to a place as soon as 
she's engaged. A nice servant never does it," an- 
swered the cook. 

" And why not, if it will accommodate the mis- 
tress ? " I demanded. 

" Well," said Mary, " I can't tell ye. I don't know 
as there's any pertickler reason, only they don't like 
it. Why, the missus wanted me to come a week ago, 
saying she was so put to without a cook ; but I 
wouldn't do it. I don't approve of hurrying things 
like that." 

By the dim candlelight I could see a self-satisfied 
smile on Mary's face, and I questioned her no more, 
concluding that servants, as well as other people, had 
a right to do things "on general principles" with- 
out assigning, or even having, any reason for their 
actions. 

" I don't think I'll stay here after this year," re- 
marked Annie, as she began to unbutton her boots. 

" Why not ? " I asked. " Don't you like it ? " 

" Of course I don't. Nobody could like such a 
hard place. But that isn't the reason. I've been here 
over a year now, and two years is long enough to 
stop in any place, good or bad. You get used to 
doing things the way to suit one missus, and, if you 
stay too long, it's hard to learn to suit other missuses, 
so I believe in changing round — that's my opinion." 

Saying which, she threw her boots in the middle 
of the floor, and put her head under the pillow, in- 
stead of upon it. She always slept that way, and I 



In Cap and Apron. 53 

suspected that it was done to soften the clanging of 
the alarm-bell which rang out fiercely at six every 
morning. I did not always follow Annie in her line 
of reasoning, and I could not quite understand her 
objections to stopping a long time even in a good 
place ; but I put it down to the fact that she, like 
the cook, acted sometimes " on general principles." 

Annie, on the whole, was a good servant. She 
took pride and interest in her work, and had at first 
impressed me as being very conscientious. My faith 
in this latter quality was a little shaken by an incident 
that happened one day in the drawing-room. It was 
before the cook came, and she was helping me to 
wash some of the more expensive pieces of bric-a- 
brac. I sat on the floor with a pail of water and a 
cloth, cleaning some ivory and marble figures. I put 
a small statue of Mercury into the pail, took it out, 
and beheld that it was headless. I was bewildered, 
for I had been particularly careful in the process, and 
I knew I could not have knocked it against the pail. 
As I sat with the head in one hand and the body in 
the other, Annie startled me with, " The missus is 
coming ! Hide it quick, or she'll see it ! " 

" Of course, I shan't hide it," I retorted, angrily ; 
and then Mrs. Allison came towards me. 

" Oh, I forgot to tell you, Lizzie, that several of 
these figures have been broken and glued together, 
and ought not to be put in hot water. Lay it aside] 
and I will mend it again." 

o 

Annie looked crestfallen and ashamed. Mrs. 
Allison spoke pleasantly to me in those days. That 
was before I had offended her by asking for better 
breakfasts. Afterwards she sent me to " Coventry," 



54 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

and -never looked at me except with forbidding 
brow. 

Up to Wednesday I had escaped the scrubbing, 
for, when I turned out the young ladies' rooms the 
day before, I carefully arranged that twilight should 
come on before I got to that part of the work. Then 
the occupants were obliged to dress for dinner, and I 
would be in the way. Besides, the floor must not be 
damp when they went to bed, so they smilingly in- 
formed me that I need "never mind" about it. From 
that time I was their true friend, and when Miss 
Allison lay on the bed the next day with a jumping 
toothache I took my bottle of Pond's Extract to her 
and insisted that frequent applications would help 
her. In the evening, when she and Miss Blanche 
went to the theatre, I whistled for a hansom and 
helped them in with all the good grace imaginable, 
stepping up in front and closing the doors very care- 
fully, so as not to catch their dresses. I even ceased 
to use " language " in my heart when pretty Miss 
Blanche, who had operatic aspirations, went from 
room to room screaming " a-a-ah " up and down 
through all the different keys. Both of them always 
wished me a cheery " Good-morning," even after I 
was discharged, and I have only the most pleasant 
recollections of them. 

When, on Wednesday afternoon, the decree went 
forth that I should take up all the rugs in the 
drawing-room and scrub the floor, I felt that the evil 
day could no longer be put off, though how I was to 
carry through my commission was more than I knew. 
I dared not confide my ignorance to anyone, lor 
when I engaged with Mrs. Allison, I assured her that 



In Cap and Apron. 55 

I had never been a servant, but had learned how to 
work at home, which was true enough — at least, I 
thought it was, for I knew the chapter headed 
" Housemaids," in the book on " Servants' Duties," by 
heart. But that chapter had said nothing about 
scrubbing. I suppose the literary lady who wrote it 
lived in a house where there was no scrubbing to be 
done. Thus I was utterly in the dark as to how to 
go at my task, and was obliged to follow my own 
ideas on the subject. I took from my cupboard two 
pails, one half full of soapy water, the other con- 
taining fresh water for rinsing, and with flannel and 
brush I started out to do or die, or both. From the 
conversation with the charwoman, I had gathered 
that it was proper to go on one's knees for the opera- 
tion ; but she had said that a former servant in this 
family had got housemaid's knee by kneeling on the 
cold floors. It was not part of my plan to contract 
the disease, and then I was afraid of soiling and 
wetting my print dress, which I wished to keep fresh 
and neat-looking for my next place. 

In scrubbing that drawing-room I kept two ideas 
in mind : first, to ward off housemaid's knee ; second, 
to keep myself and costume out of the wet. So 
pinning up my frock, I took the brush and assumed a 
squatting position, hopping about from place to place. 
I scrubbed a square yard at a time, then rinsed in 
clean water and dried it, congratulating myself the 
while that I was something of a Columbus in my 
way. I had nearly finished, when, glancing toward 
the folding-doors, I saw Mrs. Allison looking at me, 
her large black eyes burning with anger. Had I 
been on the ground-floor, I am sure I should have 



56 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

jumped from the window and precipitately departed 
from my situation, so dangerous did the lady of the 
house appear. 

" Well, a pretty servant you make, I must say ! 
Any girl with half a grain of sense would know how 




MY SYSTEM OF SCRUBBING. 

to scrub. You haven't even got general intelligence ! " 
was the announcement that burst from her. Now 
I had always been told that I had a large bump 
of combativeness and was able to hold my own in 
a dispute ; but this time I was speechless, feeling that 
my position really was untenable. I had nothing to 
say in my own defence ; but a sense of the ridiculous 
overcame my prudence, and I smiled blandly in Mrs. 



In Cap and Apron. 57 

Allison's face. She uttered a contemptuous, impatient 
" Oh ! " and left me. 

I hurriedly finished the room, put the rugs and 
furniture in place, and, perched on the top of the 
step-ladder, polished the looking-glasses with tissue- 
paper. The steps were more than twice my own 
height, and when I attempted to lift them from one 
part of the room to another I found it a case of 
" when Greek meets Greek," and was obliged to pull 
them along after me as best I could. 

That evening Annie again broached the needle- 
work subject, fearing, I suppose, that I would go 
on the morrow and leave her to clear out the mending- 
basket I had postponed it as long as I well could, 
without admitting point-blank that I was unable to 
cope with the task, so I determined to do unto Annie 
as I would have her do to me under similar circum- 
stances. I remembered to have seen my mother put 
a wooden ball into the toes and heels when she 
darned stockings, and I asked Annie for the darning- 
bali. She had never heard of such a thing. 

" But I must have one, or I can't darn them," I 
insisted. 

She brought me an oval-shaped soda-water bottle. 

" Maybe that'll do. It's sort of round," she said. 

I thought it would, and, feeling that " well begun 
is half done," I attacked the enemy, and darned to the 
best of my ability. If the wearers of those stockings 
got bad feet on account of the lumps and seams, I 
can only say I am very sorry, and pledge my word 
to avoid mending-baskets hereafter. 

On Thursday I washed out all the dusters and 
made my cupboard as tidy as possible preparatory 



58 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

to taking my departure. Mrs. Allison did not speak 
to me again after the scrubbing episode. When at 
six o'clock I informed her that I was ready to go, 
she silently handed me six shillings, which was really 
liberal, for she only owed me five shillings and four- 
pence halfpenny. I thanked her and said good-bye, 
but she did not answer. I do not doubt that long 
before this she has realised the bad taste she dis- 
played in thus showing her temper. 

In my story of my life at Mrs. Allison's house 
I have spoken of her only as a mistress. Some of 
my friends who know her personally have assured 
me that, socially and intellectually, she is a most 
charming woman to meet. I did not go into 
her house as an enemy or detective to pry into her 
private affairs. Although many opportunities were 
given me for doing this, I refused to take advantage 
of them. I was a journalist seeking information on 
a certain subject. She happened to answer my 
advertisement, and was the first person who offered 
me a place, which I accepted. I have given an 
account of my experiences at her house as a servant ; 
that is all. Mr. Allison, who is a man well known 
in the professional world, was always pleasant with 
me ; Mr. John Allison, the eldest son, treated me 
politely, but always with dignity ; while the nice 
ways of Master Tom won my admiration from the 
first. Miss Kate, the youngest member of the family, 
went to the country shortly after I arrived, and I 
saw little of her. 

When I left Mrs. Allison's house I went to a 
jeweller's and left the six shillings she paid me to 
be made into a bracelet. Then I jumped into a cab 



In Cap and Apron. 59 

and was driven to Mrs. Brownlow's in Kensington, 

where I was to enter another situation ; this time as 
parlourmaid. 



CHAPTER VI. 

PARLOURMAID TO MRS. BROWNLOW. 

MRS. BROWNLOW'S residence was a pretty little 
house in Kensington, with the name " Elsmore 
Lodge " done in gold letters over the highly-polished 
dark green door. The brass bells, knocker, and 
letter-box shone out like new mirrors, and, as I 
stood waiting for my ring to be answered, I could 
see my reflection in the door-plate. The great wide 
hall into which I was admitted by the housemaid 
seemed to have been newly carpeted for the winter, 
and bright-coloured rugs were strewn about the floor. 
The housemaid, who informed me that her name 
was Alice, told me that Mrs. Brownlow had gone 
out to dinner, and had instructed her to show me 
to. my room. I had already, on the preceding Sun- 
day, been shown through the house by Mrs. Brown- 
low, who said that, of course, I must see the house 
before I could tell whether I would like the situation ; 
but Alice thought I had better take another look 
over the place, and to humour her I followed her 
from one room to another. 

On either side of the front hall there was a large 
room, one the dining-room, the other the library. 
The dining-room was covered with Japanese matting, 
with a large crumb-cloth in the centre, and other 



60 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

rugs scattered about. The furniture was of beautiful 
old English oak and leather, and many pictures of 
game, fruit, fish, horses, and dogs hung on the wall. 
In a corner Alice called my attention to a lift, 
connecting the kitchen and dining-room. She ex- 
plained that, before laying the table, I was to put 
all the china on the lift and draw it up, and that 
the cook would send up the meats and vegetables 
just as the family sat down. 

" You'll have to toe the mark if you keep this 
place," said she confidentially. " Missus sent the 
last parlourmaid away because she didn't make the 
glasses shine and broke so many dishes. Just before 
she left she broke a big punch-bowl and a lot of 
cups, and never told. Missus found it out a few 
hours before she went, and took out a part of her 
wages for it. It was a shame, wasn't it ? " 

" Why, no, I don't think so. What right had she 
to break the dishes and not say anything about it ? 
And, besides, if it was her fault, she ought to pay 
for them," I answered, for the moment putting myself 
in Mrs. Brownlow's place and feeling that I should 
have done the same thing under similar circum- 
stances. 

A very unpleasant look gathered on Alice's face 
as I said it. 

" Oh ! so you take the part of the missus against 
the servants, do you ? I don't." 

From that time I knew I had an enemy. 

We went into the library, which was decorated 
in Oriental style. There were pictures, books, news- 
papers, magazines, two writing-desks, and a large 
music-box in a corner, which, after Alice had set it 



In Cap and Apron. 6i 

in motion, played me a merry welcome to my new 
situation. Up the wide staircase, padded and carpeted 
so that no footfalls could be heard, we went to the 
drawing-room on the first floor. The room was not 
so elegant nor so large as that at Mrs. Allison's, but 
it was pretty and homelike, with the appearance of 
having been furnished more for comfort than display. 
Mrs. Brownlow's bedroom came next — a veritable 
bower of pink. The dressing-table, I noticed, was at 
the side of the window, and not in front, as is the 
usual custom. Adjoining this room was the sewing- 
room, which, Alice said, would also be used by the 
maid as a sleeping-room, as Mrs. Brownlow had 
made some changes in order to give me a bedroom 
to myself. On the next floor was the bath-room 
in which was a gas geyser, a bedroom for Miss 
Brownlow, the daughter of the house, Mr. James 
Brownlow's room, and two servants' rooms. The 
room occupied by Alice and the cook was a large, 
comfortable place with red ingrain carpet on the 
floor. There were two toilet-tables and bureaus 
combined, with separate washbowls, soap-cups, &c, 
bright pictures on the walls, and no religious mot- 
toes. Then I went into my own room, a snug little 
place which Mrs. Brownlow had just fitted up 
for me. It was very cosy, had fresh carpet, and a 
nice clean set of single bedroom furniture. The little 
bed had a good mattress and springs, and was covered 
with a spotless white quilt. Under the mantel there 
was a small gas-grate. Alice told me there were no 
coal-fires in the house, and that even the cooking 
was done by gas. Each room had a gas-stove in the 
grate, and it was only required to strike a match 



62 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

to light the fires. She added, however, that, for some 
reason, Mr. Brownlow did not quite like the gas-fires, 
and was negotiating with a stove company to build 
and put up a large furnace in the cellar, and thus 
heat all the halls and rooms by registers, after the 
American plan. On my first interview Mrs. Brown- 
low had told me that the servants were allowed to 
have fires in their rooms in the morning and evening, 
and when changing their dresses in the afternoon, 
provided they were always careful to turn off the gas 
when they went to bed or left the room. 

As I put away the few clothes I had brought with 
me, Alice stood waiting for me. 

" Where's your box ? " she asked, noticing my 
very small handbag. 

" It is at my lodgings in Camberwell. I thought 
I wouldn't go to the expense of bringing it here till I 
knew whether I would suit Mrs. Brownlow. I've 
never been in service before, you know," was my 
answer. 

In the basement, Alice took me about and showed 
me the various china cupboards, and the pantry where 
I was to wash the glass and silver. As none of the 
family were at home to dinner, I had no waiting at 
the table. At eight o'clock we had our own dinner, 
which consisted of a joint, potatoes, brussels sprouts, 
and a boiled pudding. There were four of us — Sarah 
the cook, Janette the French maid, Alice, and myself. 
We had plenty of dinner, which was well-cooked and 
nicely-served, and I learned that usually the family 
and the servants had the same food. The table was 
spread in a comfortable little room off the kitchen, 
and the knives, forks, and spoons were not of the 



In Cap and Apron. 63 

peculiar brassy variety supplied to the servants at 
Mrs. Allison's. Sitting opposite to Alice, I had a 
good opportunity to study her. She was tall, with a 
pretty face and trim figure, but she had the appearance 
of being treacherous and dishonest, and I wondered 
how she had managed to remain in her situation so 
long. Janette I liked very much better, and the cook 
seemed a pleasant, good-natured sort of woman. 
After dinner Alice went up-stairs to tidy the rooms, 
and I remained in the kitchen until about half-past 
nine. I watched the cook wash up the dishes, and 
saw that she did the work after the manner of Annie 
and the cook at Mrs. Allison's. The cooking utensils 
were not washed at all, but put up on the scullery 
table to remain until the next morning. The dishes 
rattled together in the pan, and chip after chip came 
of! through her careless manner of handling them. 

When Mrs. Brownlow returned, I was asked to 
go to her room. She was particularly kind in her 
manner of treating me, not in a patronising way, 
but as one woman talking to another who was less 
fortunate than herself. Although she evinced more 
interest in my previous history than had Mrs. Allison, 
she asked all her questions with tactful delicacy. She 
said she was anxious that I should think of her as 
much in the light of a friend as a mistress, although 
she paid me money for the work I was to do, and 
expected it to be well done. She explained that in 
employing me she was making an experiment, and, \{ 
she found it a successful one, she would make an 
entire change in her staff of servants, and engage 
girls of education to take the places of the cook and 
housemaid. 



64 . Campaigns of Curiosity. 

U I have given you a bedroom alone," said 
Mrs. Brownlow, " because I thought you would find 
it much pleasanter to keep to yourself. You will 
probably want it quiet for reading and writing in 
the evening and on Sunday." 

I fully appreciated Mrs. Brownlow's thoughtfulness 
in regard to the bedroom, although I could not help 
regretting that, under the circumstances, I would not 
be able to hear the night gossip of the cook and 
housemaid. Before leaving I was given the following 
list of the parlourmaid's duties : — 

" Rise at seven o'clock, and be ready for the 
servants' breakfast at 7.15. Afterwards sweep and 
dust the front hall and drawing-room, lay the table 
for the nine o'clock breakfast, wait at table and clear 
away, attend to the glass and silver, light gas-fires 
in drawing- and dining-rooms, sweep and dust the 
dining-room, clean the lamps, lay the table for one 
o'clock luncheon, clear away, prepare for dinner and 
wait at table. After each meal shake the crumb- 
cloth, and answer the door during the day. Always 
to be dressed in time for luncheon." 

Besides this daily round, a part of each day in 
the week was to be given to some special work, such 
as turning out the drawing-room, dining-room, clean- 
ing silver, &c. On Saturday I was to assist the 
housemaid in airing and repairing the table and bed 
linen, the needlework of the family being done by the 
ladies' maid. I was to have an afternoon off each 
week, and be allowed to go to morning or evening 
service on Sunday, if I desired. On Sunday it was 
arranged that each servant should have half the day 
to herself, and the cook had every Sunday afternoon 



In Cap and Apron. 65 

off, a mid-day dinner being served, and either Alice 
or I preparing and clearing away the eight o'clock 
supper. 

Mrs. Brownlow's list did not terrify me as Mrs. 
Allison's had done, for the amount of work required 
was not unreasonable, and there was no starting 
with the day's work without breakfast. Mrs. 
Brownlow told me she had experienced considerable 
trouble in regard to the cleaning of knives, blacking 
of boots, and scrubbing the front step, each servant 
declaring it was the other's place to do these things, 
until finally she had procured the services of a 
member of the Houseboy's Brigade, who came every 
morning to do this work, while once a week a larger 
boy from the same place washed all the windows in the 
house. It seemed to me most disgraceful that there 
should have been rioting in the kitchen over a few 
knives and boots. With such a small family and 
convenient house, three servants should have done 
the work easily. I told Mrs. Brownlow that I was 
perfectly willing to clean the knives and the boots, 
but she only smiled and said — 

" We will wait a few weeks and see how things 
turn out." 

That night, comfortable as my bed was, I did not 
soon go to sleep, for Mrs. Brownlow's kind face and 
gentle manners were always in my mind, and I 
began to think over a plan by which I might supply 
her with a good servant when I left, provided, of 
course, everything should prove satisfactory on both 
sides. 

At 7.15 the next morning we sat down to the 
kitchen breakfast, which consisted of fried bacon, 
F 



66 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

potatoes, toast, and coffee. I complimented Sarah 
on her tasty way of cooking, and she smiled benignly, 
saying that she had been a professed cook for ten 
years, and hoped she did know something about her 
business. William Johnson, the brigade boy, came 
in about 7.30, and the cook, remarking that she 
supposed he was as hungry as usual, put a large 
plate of bread-and-butter and a cup of coffee before 
him with the knives and boots. I had seen hungry 
boys before, but I really never came in contact with 
a growing boy who had such a capacity for bread 
and coffee as William Johnson. In six minutes he 
had disposed of five large thick slices of bread and 
three cups of coffee. 

" Don't you have any breakfast before you go to 
work ? " I asked. 

"Yes'um, at half-past five, but I gets hungry 
again," was his reply. 

In half an hour I was ready to sweep the drawing- 
room, while Alice started to clean the stairs and 
landings. 

" The other parlourmaid always swept the front 
hall first, and I think it's the best way," she observed 
as I opened the drawing-room door, with broom and 
dustpan in hand. 

- " I should say that was a very bad way," I 
answered. "What is the use of my sweeping the front 
hall while you sweep the stairs and landings above ? 
Some of the dust would drop down, and you would 
dirty it as fast as I cleaned it. You sweep while I 
attend to the drawing-room, and I'll do the hall 
afterwards." 

She looked very snappish, and declared she did 



In Cap and Apron. 67 

not approve of new-fangled notions, and what was 
the difference anyhow, so long as I could say I had 
done it ? 

In laying the breakfast-table I found that all the 
glasses were smeared and covered with finger-marks, 
while the silver looked as if it had never been properly 
washed. There was egg or paste, or something 
of the kind, between the prongs of every fork. I 
was aware that in many instances parlourmaids over- 
came these difficulties by using their aprons as 
towels ; but, not quite approving of that plan, I sent 
the things down on the lift and washed them again. 
After breakfast, looking on my list, I saw that Friday 
was the day for cleaning the silver. Mrs. Brownlow 
informed me that Clara, my predecessor, had always 
left the powder in the crevices of the plate, declaring 
she could not remove it, however much she brushed, 
and added, " I hope you will find a way of getting it 
off." After rubbing it I washed and brushed it in 
hot water with soap and ammonia, which removed 
every particle of white dust. Mrs. Brownlow was so 
pleased with the result that she avowed her intention 
of making me her deputy-housekeeper. 

" You see," said she, " I am so interested in my 
painting and music that I do not like to keep my 
mind too much on household matters, but I do want 
everything clean and nice." 

I did not tell her how fully I appreciated her 
situation, nor of my unfitness for the position of 
housekeeper. 

When I attended to the lamps, they looked as if 
they had not been well trimmed and cleaned for the 
past few months. The "wicks were crooked and 
F 2 



6S Campaigns of Curiosity. 

crusted, while the ventilating burners were com- 
pletely filled up with lampblack and dirt. After 
vainly trying to remove it with a pin and brush, it 
occurred to me that the only possible way to get rid 
of it would be to boil all the burners. So I put them 
in a saucepan on the stove, with plenty of hot water 
and soda, and in an hour they came out bright and 
clean. As I was putting the chimneys in a basin 
preparatory to washing them, Alice made some excuse 
to come into the pantry, and said she never had seen 
such goings on as stewing lamp-burners and putting 
chimneys in water, which was sure to break them. 
They should be cleaned with a cloth and chimney- 
brush. As I paid no attention to her, she soon left 
me, and expressed her opinion to the cook of " them 
smart girls that knows so much." At dinner I had 
the satisfaction of overhearing Mr. Brownlow remark 
to his wife, "That girl's a jewel! See the chimney 
how it shines, and not a particle of odour about the 
lamp ! " 

It was with considerable consternation that I 
attempted to open the first bottle of wine at the 
dinner-table. I had practised parlourmaiding to 
some extent before I left home, and had proudly 
acquired the knack of folding serviettes in the shape 
of a slipper, but try as I would I had found myself 
unable to manage a corkscrew. Had I been per- 
mitted to go into the hall with the bottle, I think I 
might have accomplished the feat a little more satis- 
factorily. The cork broke off, and at last I was 
obliged to push the remainder of it into the bottle, 
and a part of the contents came whizzing up in my 
face. After that accident it seemed to me everything 



In Cap and Apron. 6g 

went wrong, and I several times had to stop and 
ponder over which was my right hand and which my 
left, and put myself exactly behind the person I wa? 
serving before I ventured to put down a plate or a 
knife and fork. I could have wept for joy when I 
heard Mr. James Brownlow remark, " Mother, I don't 




THE CONTENTS CAME WHIZZING UP IN MY FACE. 



mind opening the wine hereafter. I think it is rather 
hard work for a girl." 

The next day, after I had opened the door for a 
visitor, Mr. Brownlow met me in the hall, and said, 
" Lizzie, do you know the difference between a friend 
of the family and a bill-collector ? " 

" Yes, sir, I think I do," I replied, remembering 
that in my own experience I had often found a very 
painful difference between the two. 



yo Campaigns of Curiosity. 

" Well, now, you must not let any collectors get 
into this house for the next month. I'm in Paris, 
see ? Don't wait till they tell you what they want, 
but you must be able to spot them on sight, and say 
at once I'm not in London. That last girl of ours got 
me in more trouble by her stupidity in letting tax- 
gatherers and dressmakers and tailors in the house. 
Said she didn't know how she was going to tell what 
they wanted when they wouldn't give their business. 
To be a good parlourmaid you must be a mind- 
reader, and you look as if you could do something in 
that line." 

I bowed my acknowledgment of the compliment, 
and promised to do my best. I knew that in order 
to fulfil my part of the compact I must bring to play 
all my native powers of discernment. If I had had 
small tradespeople to deal with, my task would have 
been an easy one ; or, if all bill-collectors had been 
accommodating enough to wear pot-hats, I might 
still have experienced no difficulty. Mrs. Brownlow 
had told me, when she engaged me, that, after the 
first month, she would increase my wages^and had let 
drop a hint that her husband, a stockbroker in the 
City, was at present a little short of money because of 
the hard times in America, where he was largely 
interested in certain securities ; so I had no difficulty 
in understanding Mr. Brownlow's objection to a 
particular class of visitors. 

Half an hour after my conversation with the head 
of the house the bell rang, and I opened the door to a 
tall, handsome-looking man, having all the appear- 
ance of belonging to the gentry. It was only about 
10.30, and I could not believe the man had come to 



In Cap and Apron. 71 

make a party call at that time in the morning, so 
when he asked for Mr. Brownlow I said, " He's gone 
to Paris ; but will you please tell me your business ? " 

" Oh, no, it's not necessary ; I'll see Mrs. Brown- 
low. She will do quite as well." 

Now, I had been warned against men who would 
not tell their business, and I said, "She's gone to 
Paris, too, and won't be back for a month." 

" Well, it's a fine performance ; that's all I've got to 
say," was his answer, as he turned to go. 

" Won't you leave your name ?" I asked. 

" No," he replied, rather savagely, and walked out. 

I congratulated myself on my prowess, and went 
up-stairs to describe the man to Mrs. Brownlow, when 
I discovered that I had turned away the wrong man. 
Still, I was not disheartened by my first failure, and 
after two or three days' practice I became quite an 
expert in that line. The experience I thus gained 
was not only of immense service to Mr. Brownlow, 
but will probably prove of great value to me per- 
sonally. 

In a few days I had become quite accustomed to 
my duties, and I felt that the position of parlour- 
maid at Elsmore Lodge was not a hard one. Mrs. 
Brownlow was one of the most considerate women I 
had ever met, and tried in every way to make her 
servants comfortable ; but neither the cook nor Alice 
showed any appreciation of her kindness. Both of 
them were continually on the defensive, and seemed 
to believe that mistress and servant must necessarily 
look upon each other as enemies. Sarah cooked well, 
but her extravagance was appalling. In spite of Mrs. 
Brownlow's order that all the small pieces of bread 



?2 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

should be used up for puddings and dressing, 
Sarah allowed them to remain in the bread-box until 
they moulded, and then threw them away ; while 
sugar, potatoes, and cold meat disappeared with the 
most astonishing rapidity. Alice aided and abetted 
her in every possible way. I began to wonder if, after 
all, good treatment was appreciated by many of the 
girls who went out to service, and I decided that it 
did not always follow that a kind mistress made a 
good servant. 



CHAPTER VII. 

MY LAST DAYS IN SERVICE. 

DURING my stay at Mrs. Brownlow's I discovered 
that domestic labour, arranged in a reasonable manner, 
was not in itself difficult work. Not having a taste 
for household duties, and having had no experience 
except that gained by practising some of the parlour- 
maid's duties at home and a week's observation and 
work at Mrs. Allison's, I was not, of course, so well 
equipped as a well-trained domestic servant would 
have been ; but, in spite of these drawbacks, I did the 
work quickly and neatly, and Mrs. Brownlow informed 
me that none of her former servants had suited her so 
well. She began at once to plan how she might dis- 
pense with ordinary domestics, and replace them by 
young women who would take a genuine interest in 
their work and render her something more than eye 
service. Sarah was an excellent cook, and there was 
no fault to be found with the food as it was prepared 



In Cap and Apron. 73 

for the table ; but she was afflicted with a very common 
complaint among cooks, laziness, and was continually 
talking about the need of a kitchen-maid, although 
the whole basement was conveniently fitted up, and 
the cook's duties were so light that her mistress did 
not feel disposed to hire an assistant for her. Mrs. 
Brownlow had consented, at the cook's request, to 
have only one set of meals prepared, except as 
regarded the servants' breakfast, the kitchen breakfast 
coming earlier, as a matter of course. At eleven they 
were allowed a light luncheon, and at half-past one, 
after the family had lunched, the servants ate the 
same food as was served at the dining-room table, and 
for the night dinner it was arranged that they could 
dine immediately after dessert was served. Although 
these changes in the usual routine of servants' meals 
were made to please the cook and lighten her labours, 
she did not show any appreciation of the favour, and 
positively refused to scrub the doorstep, clean the 
knives, or black the boots/which she declared was not 
" her place," while the housemaid insisted that she did 
not " bargain for that business." 

Mrs. Brownlow was a woman of gentle, even 
temper, who took for her motto, " Live peaceably 
with all men, if it be possible," and so to preserve any- 
thing like the semblance of order in her household, 
she hired the brigade boy to attend to these things, 
and was constantly putting herself to trouble and 
expense for the sake of her servants. She had a 
decided talent for artistic work, and was interested in 
music, and, as she explained to me, she did not care 
to devote her whole attention to the management of 
her house. Her daughter, a young lady of about 



74 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

twenty, had but recently made her debut in society, 
and had literary aspirations, as she one day confided 
to me. She did not wish to turn housekeeper, and the 
French maid did not understand enough English to 
act as deputy for her mistress. If the servants had 
been of the sort who would perform their duties con- 
scientiously, Mrs. Brownlow need have devoted only 
one hour each morning ta overlooking the house- 
keeping ; but, as it was, they took advantage of her 
kind and easy way, and the two chief qualities dis- 
played by the cook and housemaid were indolence 
and extravagance. 

" Why do you not wipe the hot- water cans before 
you set them in the hall ? " I said one morning to 
Alice, who had been distributing the water at the 
different bedroom doors. 

" Because it's too much trouble," she answered, 
with a toss of her head. 

" But you will ruin the carpet," I insisted. 

" Well, it's not your carpet, so you will please 
mind your own business," she retorted. 

Now, what could be done with a girl so perfectly 
devoid of honour ? I asked her how she expected 
to keep a situation, and how she could get a character, 
if she did not try to please her mistress. 

" Well, I'd make a time if she wouldn't give me 
a character," was her answer, as she went to the next 
floor dripping water over the stairs. 

And she did " make a time ; " for the very next 
day Mrs. Brownlow, losing all patience with her 
because she would not turn the mattresses or even 
take the quilts entirely off before making the beds, 
said, "Alice, I cannot put up with your careless 



In Cap and Apron. 75 

habits any longer, and I wish you would look for a 
new situation. I give you notice to-day ■ 

Alice replied, " I'll go to-day if you 11 give me a 
month's wages and let me have a character." 

"It will be impossible for me to give you a 
character, unless it is a very bad one," answered her 

mistress. 

And then the "time" commenced. Alice threat- 
ened her with all the dreadful consequences imagin- 
able • said she knew certain things she would tell all 
over' London, and accused Mrs. Brownlow of taking 
the bread out of her mouth. She did not become quiet 
until Mr. James Brownlow came in and gave her what 
he described as a "dressing down," when she slunk 
away to the kitchen, whimpering about the cruelties 
of mistresses, and giving her opinion in no gentle 
terms of certain kinds of parlourmaids. 

However, she did not leave that day, probably 
deciding that it would be better to remain her month 
out with the hope that she might, after all, obtain 
the' "character" to help her secure another situation. 
On Sunday she took her half-day off, going out im- 
mediately after breakfast, and I did the bedroom 
work that morning. Everything was much more 
convenient and comfortable than it had been at 
Mrs Allison's. Two of the rooms being on the 
same floor with the bathroom, the filling of the water- 
pitchers was an easy matter, and I had only to go 
down one flight of stairs to carry water to Mrs. 
Brownlow's room. With the assistance of Janette 
I was through all the work by eleven o'clock, and 
was able to rest until it was time to lay the table 
for the two o'clock dinner. In the afternoon I 



76 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

remained in my room, attending to some newspaper 
correspondence, and writing a long letter to the 
Editor of the Weekly Sun. I requested him to 
look up for me a superior young woman, thoroughly 
domesticated, who would be willing to take a situation 
as parlourmaid in Mrs. Brownlow's house when I left 
the following Thursday, as he knew I must do. I 
gave a full description of the family, the house, and a 
list of the duties expected of the parlourmaid. Then 
I made arrangements to have a telegram sent me on 
Wednesday requesting my presence in the City that 
afternoon on important business, which would appear 
to give me a plausible excuse for resigning my situa- 
tion. 

That night I slept the sleep of the just, and 
awoke Monday morning feeling fortified against all 
the attacks of Alice, my enemy. We were engaged 
all day in preparing for Mrs. Brownlow's recep- 
tion, which was to be given in the evening. 
Two extra servants were hired to answer the door 
and assist in waiting on the guests, who began to 
arrive about half-past nine. At twelve o'clock I was 
serving punch and sweets in the drawing-room, and 
was getting on famously, when I heard someone 
exclaim under his breath, " Well, my eyes ! " and, 
looking towards the speaker, I recognised an ac- 
quaintance, a well-known London publisher. In 
spite of my consternation, I was rather amused at 
the look of bewilderment on his face ; for he knew 
nothing of the experiment I was making, and 
two weeks before I had entertained him in my 
own home. My cap and apron had not disguised 
me as much as I had hoped, and, knowing the 



In Cap and Apron. yy 

proclivity of the male sex to gossip, I began to pull 
my wits together to plan a way to prevent a catas- 
trophe and save myself from detection. When I 
went to the dining-room for further supplies, I hur- 
riedly wrote on a slip of paper, " You don't know 
me, understand," and, returning to the drawing-room, 
I slipped the note into his hand as I passed him a 
plate of sandwiches. Then he was seized with 
sudden convulsions of laughter, which nearly made 
me lose my equilibrium, but I felt sure that he was 
a true friend and would not tell when he understood 
my position. Later I opened the door for him, and 
as he passed me he whispered, " What's it for ? " and 
I answered, " A book for you to publish," whereupon 
he left the house and jumped into a hansom, hum- 
ming " Oh, my Mary Ann." 

I seemed to be fated to have romantic adventures 
at Elsmore Lodge. Tuesday night I went to bed 
at the usual time, 10.30, and I thought I had only 
slept a few minutes when I was awakened by the 
ding-a-ling of the front-door bell. Lighting a match, 
I discovered that it was three o'clock. The house 
was perfectly quiet except for the bell, which 
seemed to be summoning me down-stairs unto 
dreadful things I knew not of. To say that I was 
afraid to go to the door only mildly expresses my 
feelings. My room was a back one, so I could not 
first look out of the window and inspect the bearing 
of the visitor. Finally I plucked up a small amount 
of courage, donned my dress and slippers, and with 
a night-lamp I started down-stairs, trying to shame 
myself into bravery. Was I not a journalist ? Ha 
I not bearded many a lion in his den, and should 



78 



Campaigns of Curiosity. 



now tremble at being obliged to go to the door at 
three o'clock in the morning ? It was of no use ; 
the further down-stairs I got, the more my knees 
knocked together from very fear, and I had to admit 
to myself that I was nothing but a very timid woman,, 
after all. Then I thought of a way by which I could 
view the ringer of the bell at a distance before open- 
ing the door, and I went into the library, noiselessly 




THERE ON THE STEP STOOD MR. JAMES BROWNLOW." 



unbolted and drew up the window, and looked out. 
There on the step stood Mr. James Brownlow, 
ringing the bell with one hand and with the other 
vainly trying to insert the key in the lock. I took 
in the situation at once. He had been at the Savage 
Club. I quietly closed the window again and opened 
the door, uttering not a word and trying my best to 
look respectful and sedate. " Thank you. Don't 



In Cap and Apron. 79 

mention it to anybody," he said, passing up-stairs, 
while I fastened and bolted the door. So there I 
was, with a secret on my soul, and not allowed to 
tell it to anybody ! How I should have enjoyed 
repeating the story to one of his brother Savages ; 
but that was impossible, so I had to content myself 
to keep it until I got out of service, knowing that 
then I could unburden myself to the public. 

I became quite an expert in laying and waiting 
on the table, and I grew proud of my skill in making 
it look beautiful with bright china and silver. When 
I took off the table-cloth I was always careful to 
fold it in the same creases. I used a brush in clean- 
ing out the crevices of the cut-glass tumblers and 
dishes. I made such an improvement in their 
appearance that they elicited the admiration of all 
the family, especially of Mr. James Brownlow, who 
took frequent occasion to compliment me on the 
improved condition of things in general, and even 
went so far as to say that he thought the most sen- 
sible employment for all poor girls was domestic 
service, for which work I seemed particularly fitted. 
I did not feel at liberty to argue the point with him 
at that time, nor did I attempt to disabuse his mind 
of his very pleasant impression. I only thought that 
if I, in the face of so many difficulties, was able to 
satisfactorily perform the duties of a parlourmaid, 
what could not a girl with inclination and training 
do? 

Miss Mary Brownlow took quite a fancy to me, 
and one day broached the subject of my being her 
personal attendant and companion — a sort of private 
secretary for her while she was engaged in writing 



80 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

various newspaper and magazine articles, which, so 
far as I could determine, were generally returned to 
her in the stamped envelope she enclosed. I told 
her it was impossible for me to hold such a position, 
that my handwriting was neither beautiful nor easily 
read. Then she suggested that I should learn type- 
writing and take dictation from her, while I was 
obliged to use all my self-control to keep back a 
smile, wondering what her astonishment would be 
if she could see me a week later writing up my 
experiences at her home on my own beloved 
typewriting machine. 

" Oh, I could never learn, I am sure, and I would 
not like to be a secretary. I'd rather be a parlour- 
maid," I said. 

In the kitchen everything went at sixes and 
sevens. Alice, although less impertinent in her treat- 
ment of her mistress, vented her spite on me, and 
tried to the best of her ability to drive me mad with 
her constant insinuations that I was to blame for her 
discharge, and threatened to pay me up for it some 
day. She said she had lost two of her handkerchiefs 
the day before, and vaguely hinted that I used some 
just like them, till, what with the loud talking, 
bickering, and general uproar, I feared my head 
would completely give way. As it was, I was seized 
with a violent headache, which Mrs. Brownlow ob- 
served, and sent me up-stairs to lie down, while Miss 
Mary Brownlow — dear heart ! — tried to doctor me 
with the laying on of hands and brown paper satu- 
rated in vinegar. It was her own remedy, and she 
recommended it very highly. It really did me good, 
and at luncheon I was up and about again. A 



In Cap and Apron. Si 

few hours later, when we were having our tea, the 
door-bell rang, and I jumped up to answer it. 

" Go out in the area, and see who it is before you 
go up. Maybe it's only a tramp," said the cook. 

" But perhaps it's one of Mrs. Brownlow's friends, 
and suppose she looked down into the area and saw 
me. Do you think that would appear nice?" 

" Well, do as you like. I only tried to save you 
steps," was her ungracious reply. 

This going to the area to view a visitor from a 
distance is a very common practice among parlour- 
maids and menservants. I have often noticed it at 
houses where I have called. There cannot possibly 
be any excuse for it in a well-ordered house, yet I 
have seen it among servants of the very best people. 
I was discouraged with trying to instil right prin- 
ciples of action into Alice's and Sarah's minds. It 
was sowing seed on stony ground. The motto which 
they seemed to think was the proper one between 
kitchen and drawing-room was "War to the knife." 
The morning after the entertainment Alice chipped 
off a piece of a very handsome and expensive cut- 
glass dish, and said nothing to Mrs. Brownlow about 
it, although I begged her to do so. It placed me in 
rather an awkward position, for I did not wish to gain 
the reputation of being a tale-bearer, nor did I think 
it right for Mrs. Brownlow to remain in ignorance of 
the affair. In the afternoon she came down to the 
pantry to show me about rearranging the glass and 
china cupboards, and noticed the broken dish at 
once. She knew that she had sent Alice down-stairs 
with it, and, of course, concluded she had broken it ; 
but when Alice was questioned she stoutly denied it, 
G 



%2 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

saying it was whole when she put it in the cupboard. 
But her mistress had occasion to remember other 
incidents, and, although she refrained from openly 
accusing Alice, I could see that she knew who was 
the culprit. 

The cook was a very intelligent sort of person, 
well versed in her profession, and, had she cared to do 
so, she might have made a valuable servant. When 
she felt so inclined, she was able to manufacture the 
most delicious little side-dishes from small bits of 
meat, fish, or other things left over, though she 
oftener chose to present such things to her sister, who 
was almost a daily visitor in the kitchen. Sarah gave 
me occasional hints in regard to certain household 
work. She showed me how to clean the water carafes 
by the use of shot, how to restore gilt frames by 
rubbing them with turpentine, and she also informed 
me that I could keep the silver bright for a long time 
by placing a lump of camphor in the silver chest. I 
noticed that she always kept an oyster shell irr the 
tea-kettle, which, she explained, collected all the sedi- 
ment that usually gathers in such kettles and often 
makes the water look muddy. If she had only done 
as well as she knew, she would have indeed proved to 
be " a treasure." 

Wednesday, a telegram addressed to " Elizabeth 
Barrows " came to Elsmore Lodge. It was from my 
solicitor, and read, " Come to my office at once. 
Important news concerning your father's relatives. 
Must go to Liverpool." Thinking to prepare Mrs. 
Brownlow for my resignation, I showed her the 
message. 

" Perhaps it is good news for you. How nice that 



In Cap and Apron. 83 

would be ! though I would not like to have you leave 
me," she said, and then told me I might go to the 
City at once. 

I went to the office of the Weekly Sun. There I 
met a sensible young woman, named Lucy Atkins, 
the daughter of a physician with whom one of 
the members of the staff had been acquainted. She 
was refined and quiet, but tall and strong in 
appearance, and she assured me that she was 
particularly well versed in all matters connected with 
domestic work. I promised to use my influence to 
get the situation for her. I returned to Mrs. 
Brownlow, and told her I had received news which 
necessitated my presence in Liverpool, and that I was 
likely to come into the possession of a small yearly 
income, which would do away with the necessity of 
my remaining in service. Had it been possible, I 
should have preferred to tell the whole truth to Mrs. 
Brownlow ; but I knew that could not be done for the 
present, and I was obliged to invent an excuse for 
leaving her. Then I told her that, appreciating her 
kind treatment, and knowing what a comfortable 
situation a girl might find with her, I had endeavoured 
to get her another servant in my place — not a servant 
of the ordinary kind, but a woman of intelligence, 
thoroughly domesticated, and able to perform the 
duties much better than I had done. Mrs. Brown- 
low was kindness itself, and the whole matter was 
quickly arranged. I telegraphed for Lucy Atkins to 
call, and she came that evening for an interview. 
The next morning she brought her box and entered 
upon the situation, and I spent the day in showing 
her what I knew of the work. It happened that she 
G 2 



84 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

had two friends, a widow and her daughter, who 
wished a place together, the mother as cook-house- 
keeper and the daughter as housemaid or parlour- 
maid, and Mrs. Brownlow wrote, asking them to 
call on her with the object of taking them into her 
service if she was suited. When I was ready to leave, 
Mrs. Brownlow offered me my week's wages, which I 
refused to take, asking her to give the money to some 
other girl who would need it more than I. When I 
said good-bye, she told me to call on her as soon as 
possible and tell her all about myself and how I was 
getting on. I said that I would do so, and I fully 
intended to keep my promise, and explain the whole 
matter to her in the near future. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

THE MERITS OF DOMESTIC SERVICE. 

WHEN I left Mrs. Brownlow's I went at once to 
Camberwell to give up the lodgings I had been 
supposed to occupy, and to instruct the lodging-house 
keeper as to what course she was to pursue in case 
further inquiries were made concerning " Elizabeth 
Barrows." I found four letters awaiting me, each one 
offering me a situation if, after an interview, my 
appearance and qualifications were satisfactory. But 
I was obliged to give up all ideas of remaining longer 
in service, as there was other work requiring my 
attention. For the next few days I took advantage 
of every opportunity to interview mistresses and 
servants, trying to discover the rights and wrongs 



In Cap and Apron. 85 

on both sides of the question. Now, having given 
much time and thought to the question of domestic 
service, I am brought to ask myself, " What have I 
learned by my two weeks spent in service ? " I had 
first become interested in the subject through a con- 
versation with a Camberwell sewing-girl, as I stated 
in my first chapter, and then I had always contended 
that domestic work was not in itself degrading, and 
that there was no reason why the women of the 
lower classes only should go out to service. I 
wished to find out for myself if there was anything 
incompatible between refinement and domestic service, 
and I went out as a journalist, seeking information, 
with the intention of giving my personal experiences. 
I did not start with the idea that all mistresses 
were tyrants and all servants badly-treated slaves, and 
I do not set myself up as the champion of the " poor 
servant-girl." I am just as much inclined to take the 
part of the long-suffering mistress. In fact, from 
what I have seen, I have come to the conclusion that 
there are as many ill-treated mistresses as servants in 
London. I found Mrs. Allison to be an unjust and 
unreasonable mistress, demanding more work of her 
servants than she had any right to expect. With 
such a large and inconvenient house as hers, she 
needed to keep at least two strong, healthy house- 
maids to do the work properly. Had I, in my unfit- 
ness for the position, been the only one who had been 
weighed in the balance and found wanting, I should 
not thus take occasion to advise her ; but Annie, who 
was a girl accustomed to hard work from her child- 
hood, had been obliged to exchange her place as 
housemaid for what she thought might be the lighter 



86 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

duties of parlourmaid, and her predecessor had 
worked herself into the hospital. Remembering this, 
I feel that I am right in saying that Mrs. Allison is 
not considerate in her treatment of her servants, 
neither as regards the work she requires of them nor 
the kind of food with which she supplies them. I am 
not now referring to the board wages she allowed, 
but to the meals which she ordered the cook to 
prepare for them. A breakfast of bread-and-butter 
and coffee is not a proper one for a servant. In fact, 
I do not believe anyone could accomplish satisfactory 
work on such fare, unless blessed with a very delicate 
and limited sort of appetite. The noon dinner at Mrs. 
Allison's was not so bad. It usually consisted of a 
joint, potatoes, bread, and pudding, but that was the 
only good meal her servants were given. For supper 
they had bread and cheese, day after day and week 
after week. It is not an excuse for Mrs. Allison to 
say that thousands of girls would be glad to have 
bread and cheese all the year round. I am aware 
that many women are starving in London, but that 
does not justify a woman in neglecting to look after 
the wants of those in her employ. Mistresses, hiring 
servants, promise to pay them a certain wage and 
board. Shall they give their housemaids a piece of 
dry bread and say, " Take and eat it, and be thankful ; 
remembering that many girls are very hungry in the 
East-End and have not even a crust " ? 

Mrs. Brownlow, on the other hand, was kind 
and considerate with her servants. She gave them too 
much liberty, and thought more of their comfort than 
of her own well-being. Her house had been fitted up 
with a view of making the work light and easy of 



In Cap and Apron. 87 

accomplishment, and three servants should have done 
all the work and had plenty of leisure for rest and 
recreation. Alice and the cook were most ungrateful 
and neglectful, and did not in any way endeavour to 
please. So in the face of all this, it can readily be 
seen that I have no reason to pose as the defender 
of the London servant-girls ; neither am I prepared 
to condemn them all, and try to push them out of 
their situations and fill their places with another class 
of women. 

Still, with this vexing servant problem becoming 
more and more important every year, it would seem 
that something should be done to bring about a 
change. There are many young women now em- 
ployed as servants who are a disgrace to their trade. 
They have no capacity for domestic work, and are 
perfectly devoid of ideas as to the best way of 
performing their duties. Besides having no reasoning 
faculties, they have no sense of honour, and seem 
to be unable to appreciate their unfitness for such 
service. Just what they would be able to do, and 
do well, is something I have not discovered, if, indeed, 
there is any room at all for them on this planet. 
It may be that they originally had a talent for 
something ; but, if so, it must long ago have been 
wrapped in a napkin and buried deep down in the 
earth. 

Then there are girls who are eminently fitted for 
housework — those whose quiet inclinations would 
lead them to domestic labour as a means of liveli- 
hood, except for the foolish idea that in doing so 
they would demean themselves. So, down in the 
East-End, in the City, and in every direction of this 



88 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

great London, they are wearing out body and soul 
with sewing, writing in offices, factory work, and 
doing other things where the hours are many and 
the wages small, but prating ever of their " liberty n 
and "independence." If they get sufficient food to 
keep them alive and a mere covering for their bodies, 
it is all they can ever expect ; for they are ordinary, 
commonplace sort of women, these toilers, and do 
not look forward to being experts. Many of them 
would make good cooks and housemaids — some of 
them have a special talent for just such work — but 
they do not think of going out to work. Why? 
Because they must give up their " liberty." And in 
what does their present liberty consist ? So far as I 
can see, it seems to be liberty to starve. 

There are young women — daughters of genteel, 
but poor parents — living at home, a burden to their 
families, doing nothing to lighten the care of their 
overworked fathers, sitting idly by the window doing 
fancy work, perhaps, waiting and watching for what ? 
— a husband. There do not seem to be enough 
husbands in England to go around, and to many 
of these girls the desired deliverer never turns up ; 
they live on their perfectly useless lives, a burden 
to everyone about them. Why have they not been 
trained to some sort of work and qualified to take 
care of themselves? Some of them would make 
excellent cooks and houseworkers if they had proper 
training. Perhaps they already know how to per- 
form certain household duties, but to earn money 
by doing that work for other people they imagine 
would be degrading. 

And now I come to a very important phase of 



In Cap and Apron. 89 

this subject, that of the necessity for thorough training 
for domestic work. I know that the orthodox belief 
is that all women are naturally domesticated— that 
they come into the world expressly to be wives, 
mothers, and housekeepers — and when an occasional 
woman seems not to get the opportunity to take 
such a position, something has gone wrong in the 
universe, and the laws have all got entangled. From 
what I know of womankind, I am convinced that 
many women are in no way fitted for domestic 
work, and would only be miserable if they attempted 
it, although their incapacity for household work and 
management does not necessarily prevent their being 
excellent wives and mothers. I will admit that many 
girls do have a special talent for cooking, sweeping, 
and dusting; but even they need to be drilled and 
instructed, just as a person who is a natural artist, 
musician, or writer needs training for the work. It 
all the domestic arts were taught in private and 
public schools, an opportunity would be given to 
aspirants in this line to go on and perfect them- 
selves ; while, of course, those whose tastes did not 
lead them in such direction, should not be obliged 
to take up the study. The cooking schools that have 
already been started in London are accomplishing a 
vast amount of good, but free schools for instruction 
in every department of household work are much 
needed. In advocating these schools I do not 
undervalue home-training. Many young women 
have ample opportunity to go down into their own 
mothers' kitchens and take lessons in domestic 
economy; but there are hundreds of girls who 
have no homes and are unable to do this, and it 



90 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

is for them especially that such schools are in de- 
mand. 

It may be argued that with the influx of a higher 
class of women into domestic service, all the present 
servants will be thrown out of employment, and thus, 
while doing good to some, a great evil will be done 
to others. This is not likely to be the case, because 
the demand for good work is much greater than 
the supply, and there is room for both. Those men 
and women who insist that a person employed by 
them must necessarily be beneath them, and con- 
stantly show them deference as to a superior order 
of beings, will doubtless always cling to the present 
class of servants ; and then ladies who are already 
suited, and have no reason to dismiss their servants, 
are not likely to make a change. Thus it will be 
only the bad servants who will find it impossible to 
secure situations. 

Another difficulty that may present itself is that 
it would be unpleasant for girls of refinement to 
be thrown in contact with servants of a lower grade 
in the same household. The only way out of this 
difficulty would be for every lady to employ only 
one class of domestic help. I can understand how 
an educated girl, obliged to work in the com- 
panionship of such girls as Annie and Alice, 
would find her position a most unhappy one. As 
a journalist out on an adventure, I was interested in 
studying them, and in that way my association with 
them was not so unpleasant ; but, had I remained a 
servant at Mrs. Brownlow's or Mrs. Allison's, the 
society of the other servants would have made me 
utterly miserable, and they would have cared no 



In Cap and Apron. 91 

more for my companionship than I for theirs, as we 
had little in common. Ladies employing domestic 
helps would realise this, and so choose the kind of 
women they wished to have in their houses. I can see 
nothing in the work itself that would make it dis- 
tasteful to girls of genteel birth and rearing who 
have domestic tendencies. In a house properly fitted 
up with the conveniences and comforts of modern 
life the work is not drudgery, and I think there is 
as much demand in this line for education and 
scientific thought as in the majority of other callings. 
Now, I am not asking that all London be torn 
down and rebuilt to make room for a new order of 
servants. Houses like Mrs. Allison's might be made 
convenient by the expenditure of a few pounds 
in putting in lifts from the basement to the first 
floor, and fitting the bedrooms with hot- and cold- 
water pipes, which would do away with the necessity 
of carrying heavy trays and water-cans up and down 
the stairs. By doing this, the number of servants 
required would be reduced to almost half, so that 
it would be a matter of economy to make these 
improvements. The method of heating the houses 
might also be changed with great advantage. The 
insertion of hot-air furnaces or gas-grates would not 
entail much expense. There would not only be less 
work for servants, but a great stride would be made 
in the matter of cleanliness. It would not be neces- 
sary to heat the whole house up to the boiling-point, 
as Americans are accused of doing. The heat would 
be more easily regulated than with coal-fires, and, 
when the change was once made, there would be a 
large saving in the price of fuel. 



92 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

In advocating this change in domestic workers, 
I do not, by any means, announce myself as being 
in favour of what is now known as the " lady-help." 
All the " lady-helps " I have met have been too much 
afraid of soiling their hands and hurting their dignity 
to accomplish good work. Quite recently one applied 
at my home for a situation, and her first demand 
was that she should be made a " member of the 
family." I explained that such a thing would be 
impossible, and she showed the greatest amazement 
when I informed her that on my " at-home " day 
she was expected to wait on my visitors, not to chat 
with them, and when told that she must serve the 
meals, instead of joining us at the family dinner, her 
anger knew no bounds. She went off in a huff, 
saying that she would not be a servant to her in- 
feriors. It is this ridiculous way of looking at things 
that has created a prejudice against "lady-helps." 
Such help is an impossibility in a well-ordered house. 
The educated woman who engages as a domestic 
must understand that there is no question as to her 
inferiority or superiority. If she. works for a woman 
who is far below her socially and intellectually, she 
may retain her self-respect just the same. Her 
employer — I would abolish the terms "master" and 
" mistress " in this connection, as savouring of slavery 
days — does not ask her to become her companion or a 
member of the family. Such an arrangement might 
prove very unpleasant on either side. It is simply a 
business arrangement, a question of employer and 
employee. In answer to my advertisement for a 
situation, I received a few letters from women who 
wished me to be a " daughter " to them ; but, as I had 



In Cap and Apron. 93 

not advertised for a mother, I considered such pro- 
positions in very bad taste, and felt sure that no 
intelligent women would have written me such letters. 
The educated housemaid would be employed for the 
same purpose as the uneducated one. Her business 
is to sweep the floor, make the beds, and do other 
household work, just the same as the other class 
would do. No, not the same either, for she should do 
her work better. The educated parlourmaid will not 
sit down at the family dinner ; she is hired to wait at 
the table. Her employer is under no obligations to 
invite her to sit in her boudoir or introduce her to her 
friends. She is paid money for value received. Each 
must respect the other. That is the whole thing in a 
nutshell. I believe that if educated women would 
take up this matter in a proper way great good would 
come of it, not only to themselves, but to the " work- 
ing-girls " of London. 

And what shall be done about the cap and apron, 
the "Yes, ma'am," and the "No, sir"? If I were 
in service the matter of cap and apron would be of 
little importance to me so long as the costume was 
becoming. I cannot see why exception should be 
taken to such a very pretty bit of headgear as the 
ruffled cap. The girl in the cap looks much neater 
than the one without it, and it seems to be par- 
ticularly appropriate for domestic work. During 
my two weeks in service my self-respect did not 
diminish in the least. Yet I think that if some 
members of the new order of house and parlourmaids 
insist on the abolition of the cap, they will find as 
many ladies who will not make it a question of prime 
importance. Surely, no one going out as a cook 



94 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

would object to wearing a head covering which is 
merely indicative of neatness while preparing the 
food. So far as the apron is concerned, a sensible 
girl will see at a glance that it is a positively necessary 
article of apparel, and is no more a " badge " of 
anything demeaning than is the small silk or white 
apron often worn by ladies when doing fancy work. As 
for the " ma'am " and the " sir/' I think we might 
dispense with them without much loss, so long as 
proper respect is shown on both sides. A lady 
employing a person whom she knew was her social 
and intellectual equal would naturally expect to make 
certain changes in little things like this, and the 
improved kind of service would, I am sure, more than 
make up for the loss of a " Yes, ma'am." 

What about " followers " ? Shall young ladies 
employed as domestics be obliged to walk on the 
street or go in the parks in order to meet their friends 
and sweathearts ? Certainly not. They must have 
the use of a comfortable sitting-room, where they may 
receive visitors on certain afternoons or evenings, the 
number of their callers and the length of their stay 
being kept, of course, within the bounds of reason. 
The present class of servant-girls have much cause for 
complaint on this score. To stipulate that a girl shall 
have no visitors is as unkind as it is unreasonable and 
dangerous. A young woman servant is quite likely 
to have friends of both sexes, and it is probable that 
she is " keeping company." To compel her future 
husband to hang over the area-fence whistling for her 
to come out, or to oblige her to go to the park and sit 
on the benches in order to have a talk with him, is 
not only inconsiderate, it is almost indecent. She 



In Cap and Apron 95 

should be allowed to receive him once a week or once 
a fortnight in the servant's hall. It is not difficult to 
arrange this matter satisfactorily if reason is shown 
on the part of both employer and employed. 

However, taking service as it is at present, I 
think that the position of a domestic servant with 
a reasonable mistress and in a conveniently-arranged 
house is far superior to that of the sewing-girl, the 
factory-girl, or the struggling stenographer and book- 
keeper in the City. There are hundreds of places 
like Mrs. Brownlow's, where employment can be 
found for girls who are not receiving the much- 
discussed " living wage/' and for those girls, surely, 
domestic work is preferable to their present employ- 
ment. There are kind, thoughtful, and considerate 
women in London who would appreciate good 
servants and pay fair wages for work well done. 
There are also, I know, hundreds of girls who are 
especially fitted for rendering this service. I wish 
they could be brought to view this subject from 
a philosophical standpoint, and I would use my 
influence to convince them that all labour, well 
performed, is elevating, not demeaning ; that the 
woman who bakes a loaf of bread properly, polishes 
the family plate so that it may be mistaken for a 
mirror, or scrubs the kitchen table white and clean, 
giving her heart and best talents to the work, is as 
worthy of respect and praise as the painter who 
depicts on canvas the glories of the sunlit landscape, 
the poet who weaves his thoughts into verse, or the 
sovereign who reigns on a throne. 



THE "ALMIGHTY DOLLAR" IN 
LONDON SOCIETY. 



CHAPTER I. 

ADVERTISING FOR A CHAPERON. 

Americans are accused of having a too implicit con- 
fidence in the purchasing power of their country's 
coin. In fact, certain foreigners have been known to 
say that the God referred to in the motto, "In God 
we trust," engraved on the silver dollar, is in reality a 
deity of white metal designed and fashioned at the 
United States Mint. 

" The trouble with your people," said an English- 
man to me recently, " is that you put too much value 
on money. It is a convenient article, I will admit ; 
but you seem to have an idea that you can do 
anything with it." 

" And, pray, will you give me a list of the things 
money will not buy in England as well as in 
America?" I replied. 

" Well, for instance," he answered, " take birth 
and position. You have an aristocracy of money in 
America. Here we have one of blood, where pounds, 
shillings, and pence are not taken into consideration." 

" Ah, indeed ! " I responded, " I don't know any- 
thing about the pounds, shillings, and pence feature 
H 



98 Campaigns of Curiosity, 

of the case; but I am inclined to think that our 
dollars and cents are something of a social factor 
over here." 

My English friend — bless his dear old aristocratic 
heart! — appeared to be greatly shocked at my sug- 
gestion, and assured me that I was mistaken. I 
longed for facts with which to confront him, and, 
having faith in advertising as a means of getting any- 
thing that one is willing to pay for, I wrote out an 
advertisement, which the next day appeared in the 
personal columns of a prominent London paper. 
Thus it ran : — 

A YOUNG AMERICAN LADY of means 
wishes to meet with a Chaperon of Highest Social 
Position, who will introduce her into the Best English 
Society. Liberal terms. Address, " Heiress," . 

Two days later, calling at the office of an adver- 
tising agency on Piccadilly, I found eighty-seven letters 
(needless to remark that there were no post-cards) 
in answer to my advertisement. I had offers from 
every fashionable neighbourhood in London. Park 
Lane, Cavendish Square, Grosvenor Square, South 
Kensington, West Kensington, all were represented ; 
and the thoughtlessness of the writers in signing their 
full names and titles to their epistles was something 
that surprised me. However, nearly every letter was 
marked at the top "Confidential," "Private," or 
" Personal," and it seemed to be an understood thing 
that the affair should go no further. The confidence 
they exhibited in the "honour" of a total stranger 
was rather remarkable. Still, I hope the applicants 
will forgive me if, after having, in the kindness of my 
heart, kept their real names out of print, I am now 



The "Almighty Dollar? 99 

tempted to publish some of their correspondence. 
Here is a copy of one of the letters : — 

"Private.] 

" Madam, — In answer to your advertisement, I beg to say that I have 
a very charming house at the above excellent address, which, in itself, 
would almost insure you a good social position. I speak of this, 
thinking that you, being an American, may not be aware that a good 
London address is of much importance in a social way to one whose 
position is not already established by birth. I am the widow of a well- 
known English officer — the late Sir Blankety Blank — of whom you have 
doubtless heard, and I am also titled in my own right. My position is 
assured, and I can introduce you to the very best people in England, 
and present you at Court at the first Drawing Room. I could take you 
into my home next spring, or we could travel together during the 
winter and return to London at the beginning of the season. I would 
suggest that you spend the winter months, or part of them, in the 
South of France, where you would meet the most fashionable people. 
It may be of interest to you to know that I chaperoned Miss Porkolis, 
of Chicago, three years ago, and introduced her at Court, although she 
did not reside with me, as her mother took a furnished house in London 
for the season. I can give you good references as to my standing, and 
would require in return a solicitor's and banker's references as to your 
financial position. 

" My terms in London for three months in the spring would be ^"200 
per month, which would include board and residence. If you decided 
to travel, the terms while on the Continent would be ^"ioo per month, 
you to pay the travelling and hotel expenses for both. Of course, you 
would also be expected to defray such expenses as carriage-hire, a maid, 
&c. In thinking over these terms, you must take into consideration 
that I offer you exceptional advantages. — Very truly yours, 

"A. B. C, Lady .» 

In reading this letter, I was particularly struck 
with the fact that the writer, although she required 
my banker's and solicitor's reference as to my financial 
standing, asked for no voucher for my respectability 
and position in my own country. She was ready to 
bargain to introduce me not only to the best English 
society, but to the Queen herself, for upwards of 
H 2 



ioo Campaigns of Curiosity. 

;£i,000, or something over 5,000 dols. in American 
money. I agreed with her that the advantages she 
had to offer were exceptional. The name the lady 
gave was one well known to me, and I was aware 
that she was not exaggerating when she spoke of her 
position in society. I had also the honour of a 
passing acquaintance with Miss Porkolis, whom she 
mentioned as having chaperoned. Hiring the use of 

a private letter-box, I wrote Lady a letter 

couched in the following terms : — 

" Dear Madam, — In reply to your letter, I think it only honourable 
that I should tell you something of myself before making an appoint- 
ment to see you. I am an American girl, an orphan of considerable 
means, and am willing to pay liberally for what I require. I should, 
of course, give you the best of references in regard to my financial 
qualifications, and would even pay you a part of the money in advance ; 
but before meeting you I must be frank enough to inform you that 
although I myself am fairly educated and of presentable appearance, 
nearly all the members of my family are ordinary people, with little or 
no refinement and education. But, of course, none of them are in 
Europe, and you would never need come in contact with them. My 
father owned large ranches out West, and when he died, three years ago, 
left me the bulk of his fortune. I do not think there is anything about 
me that would lead you to feel ashamed of me ; but I feel it my duty to 
tell you that, so far as the rest of my family are concerned, they are 
what in my country would be termed as * common as dirt.' 

" Your terms are not higher than I should expect them to be. I 
like the idea of travelling in France ; and when I returned to England 
I should want you to give some very elegant receptions and balls for 
me — I, of course, to bear all expense connected with them. 

" As I have told you so much about my private affairs, I would not 
care to give my name and address until I again hear from you, and 
know that you would be willing to undertake my chaperonage and 
introduction at Court under such circumstances as I have mentioned. 
If you answer in the affirmative, I will make an appointment for you 
to meet me at my hotel, where I am staying with my maid. — I am, 
Madam, very truly yours, 

*• - Library, Regent Street, W. " E. L. B. 



The "Almighty Dollar** ioi 

The next day I received this note : — 

"Lady presents her compliments to E. L. B., and begs to say 

that she can see no reason why she should not act as her chaperon, 
provided E. L. B. is herself a refined young lady and can furnish the 
reference previously referred to from her solicitor and banker. Lady 

will be pleased if E. L. B. will make an early appointment for a 

meeting at her hotel.' 

That was the end of my negotiations with Lady 

. Her answer to my very frank avowal of my 

family connections certainly proved that she cared 
little for my ancestry or antecedents, so long as I 
could furnish the necessary number of dollars. 



CHAPTER II. 

OFFERS OF MARRIAGE. 



ALTHOUGH I had intended that my advertisement 
should appeal to lady chaperons only, I received 
some rather flattering offers from members of the 
opposite sex. One of the most interesting of the 
letters was from a gentleman matrimonially inclined. 
Here it is word for word : — 

*' Will the young American lady who has just put an advertisement 
in the paper relative to her desire to meet an English chaperon of high 
social position, allow the writer of this letter to address a few lines to 
her and, as Americans are always candid and outspoken, permit me to 
be the same? May I ask you to consider over what I write, and 
pe hops your advertisement may be the means of working out our 
mutual good. 

" Possibly you may desire to enter London society with the idea of 
what is called ' settling yourself. You may be more or less alone in 
England ; and perhaps you like this country, its society, and customs. 
You would possibly desire to marry an Englishman of high social 



102 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

position, who could place you in a certain circle where you would lead others. 
I am a man who holds a first-rate position. I am a country gentlemen, 
have a fine place, house, and estate, have been an officer in a distin- 
guished regiment, and know many people of position and rank. I am 
just at present in London ; and if you think it would be worth your 
trouble to at least talk the matter over, I would treat you with all 
honour and respect. This would, of course, include silence. On the 
other hand, it would be an absolute necessity that you should be a lady 
of considerable fortune ; and when I mention this, I trust that you will 
not judge me until you know my reasons for thus putting it. Whatever 
fortune you have would be always your own. 

"If you think well of what I have written you, I would be most 
happy to meet you at whatever time you may appoint, at your own 
residence or elsewhere. Then judge me and see what manner of man 
I am." 



This communication bore the stamp of a well- 
known West- End Club. In my answer I hinted that, 
although I had not advertised for a husband, I was 
not adverse to considering the matter to which he 
had so delicately alluded. Having a desire to follow 
up the affair, I engaged a room at a certain fashion- 
able hotel for a day, and made an appointment for 
the gentleman to call. On the afternoon appointed 
I awaited him in the drawing-room of the hotel. 
I wore a stylish-looking costume, various pieces of 
showy jewellery, and a pair of diamond ear-rings, 
thinking to impress my would-be husband with a 
sense of my wealth. 

At four o'clock in the afternoon my suitor made his 
appearance. He was a fine-looking aristocratic man 
of middle age. His manners were refined and elegant, 
and I could not help thinking that I was dealing with 
neither a fool nor a knave, but with a thorough 
English gentlemen. We had half an hour's chat, in 
which my social aspirations were discussed in the 



The "Almighty Dollar? 



103 



most business-like manner. I did not give my real 
name, neither did my companion tell me his own. 
I addressed him by the assumed name he had signed 
in his letter. He informed me that he was a widower 
of excellent position, but that he was somewhat finan- 
cially embarrassed. He wished to marry a lady of 



{ j$m 




"HE WISHED TO MARRY A LADY OF WEALTH." 



wealth, and for the use of her money he was willing 
to give her his name and a good social position. 

Afterwards I made some investigations in regard 
to the man ; and to my surprise I found that he 
was exactly what he represented himself to be : a 
country gentleman of titled family, who was anxious 
to recuperate his decaying fortunes by marrying an 



1 64 Campaigns of Cukidsirv. 

heiress — an American girl preferred. I discovered 
his real name and address, and since my interview 
with him I have often seen his name mentioned in 
the society columns of the papers. He is still un- 
married, and I suppose is still looking for a wife. 
So here is an opportunity for one of our American 
heiresses to purchase not only an introduction at 
Court but a husband with mortgaged estates in the 
bargain. 

All the men who wrote seemed to hold the opinion 
that, as a rich American girl, my chief desire must 
be to capture an English husband. Not every one 
was so outspoken as the writer of the epistle I have 
just quoted ; but their letters contained either direct 
or indirect proposals of marriage, provided that, after 
a meeting, I proved to be personally and financially 
acceptable. From one of the scions of the nobility 
came the following missive, penned on violet-scented 
paper : — 

" Mr. X. presents his compliments to ' Heiress,' who advertised this 
morning for a chaperon, and begs to say that he would feel honoured 

by a reply to this letter. Mr. X. is the third son of the late , of 

whom the young lady has doubtless heard. lie is twenty- nine years 
old, of good appearance, and has served as an officer in the army. 
Mr. X. would much like to arrange for a meeting with the young lady, 
to whom he would show every courtesy, and might be able to suggest a 
way by which she could even more than gratify her ambition for a 
place in English society. He would be also pleased to give her the 
best references in regard to his character as well as his high social 
standing. A letter from 'Heiress' would be treated in all confidence 
by Mr. X." 

I had no need to investigate into the genuineness 
of the foregoing. I happened to have seen Mr. X.'s 
handwriting before. In fact, he had once been pre- 



The " Almighty* Dollar? 105 

sented to me at the home of a mutual acquaintance. 
I did not answer his letter, but consigned it to the 
embers of my study fire. 

On paper of the finest quality, ornamented with 
a family crest of considerable dimensions. Mrs. Two- 
stars presented her compliments and begged to 
say that she would be happy to entertain the idea 
of chaperoning the young American lady and give 
her a delightful, cheerful home. Mrs. T., as well as 
her four daughters, had been presented at Court. 
The daughters had all married well, and their proud 
mother felt no compunction in saying that she 
thought she could introduce the young American 
lady to many gentlemen of birth and title, if not of 
fortune. She moved in excellent society, and was 
fond of entertaining. Terms for London season and 
presentation, £500, or 2,500 dols. Mrs. Twostars 
enclosed her photograph, a portrait of herself in 
her Drawing-Room gown, which, by the way, had a 
button off the front. The photograph was returned 
in the stamped and addressed envelope thoughtfully 
enclosed. The lady proved to be the daughter of a 
distinguished baronet, and the wife of a man well 
known in London society. 

Lady So-and-So, of Queen's Gate, wrote that she 
would be glad to chaperon me. Terms £600 to £800 
sterling, according to arrangements and the advantages 
required. 

The Countess de Blank was also open to an en- 
gagement. She was an Englishwoman married to a 
foreign title. 

A certain dowager of exalted rank, well known on 
two continents, informed me that she would under- 



lo6 Campaigns of Curiosity, 

take my chaperonage, and would hire a furnished 
house for me near Park Lane ; the rent would be not 
less than £50 per week during the season. Her own 
place was in the country, and she had given up her 
town house. She would devote her whole attention 
to the management of the establishment, and would 
introduce me as her young American friend or distant 
relative, if I desired. Besides the house-rent, I must 
bear the entire expense of keeping up the place, giving 
balls, theatre-parties, &c, and the dowager herself 
would expect the sum of ^"2,000 for her services. I 
supposed these figures were not remarkably high for 
a lady of so much " position," and, having some 
curiosity to make her acquaintance, I wrote asking for 
an appointment to call. 



CHAPTER III. 

WHAT IT WOULD COST. 



On the day appointed I started out to call on the 
lady who had intimated her willingness to chaperon 
me for ^"2,000. It was with considerable self-con- 
fidence that I stepped from a smart brougham before 
the door of her aristocratic abode, for I carried with 
me the assurance of my dressmaker that I looked a 
veritable Western heiress just from Paris ; and, the 
matter of dress being satisfactorily arranged, I felt 
no doubt as to my ability to carry out the role I had 

undertaken to play. The Dowager Lady was 

particularly gracious. She was not by any means 



The "Almighty Dollar'* \oJ 

such a cold-blooded bargainer as I had imagined her 
to be — that is, she did not look it. A more aristo- 
cratic, refined, and interesting woman I had never 
met. She candidly explained that she was in great 
need of money, and obliged to either increase her 
income or diminish her expenses. Unlike one of my 
other correspondents, she was unable to refer me to 
any American girl whom she had chaperoned, as 
she had never before attempted to make money 
out of her social position ; but she assured me 
that some of her friends made such use of their 
influence, and she saw no reason why she should 
not do the same. We discussed the pros and cons 
of the matter over our tea. I was promised not only 
a social position, but a husband. Just who the gentle- 
man was my hostess did not say ; but she knew he 
could be secured. But not for the ^"2,000. Oh no ! 
That sum of money would take me only so far as 
Buckingham Palace. In fact, it would not even take 
me there ; for, besides my chaperon's salary, I must 
pay the house-rent, carriage-hire, with such inci- 
dentals as butchers' and bakers' bills and other little 
accessories that in three months would certainly 
amount to considerably over £ 1 ,000. Then there was 
my wardrobe. The lady suggested that it would need 
refurnishing, and she knew of a wonderfully clever 
West-End dressmaker. There were also the pre- 
sentation dress, the bouquets, boatonnieres for the 
coachmen, a string of pearls for my neck, because they 
would be girlish and simple, and all that ; for these 
and many more things another ,£1,000 would not go 
too far. 

" And how much do you charge for the husband ? " 



108 Campaigns of Curiosity, 

was the abrupt question I felt inclined to put. But I 
only said sweetly, " If I really got married, I would not 
forget you, of course." She answered laughingly, 
" You might make me a present, you know." 

So the result of my interview was, that I was to 
pay out between ^4,000 and £5, 000 for a "season" 
in London, introductions into the best society, and a 
presentation at Court. It was more than probable 
that during my career as a society belle, some poor 
though perhaps fascinating young, middle-aged, or old 
nobleman (no matter what his age so long as his line- 
age was correct) would fall deeply in love with me, 
lured on possibly by my chaperon's representations 
concerning the state of my cattle-ranches out West. 
Then I would marry him and be an ornament to 

society, and I would give Lady a little present 

of a cheque or a house in Park Lane, or even some 
land in the far Western State, where my herds grazed 
peacefully on a thousand hills. Surely the purchasing 
power of the "almighty dollar" was not to be 
despised 1 

Thinking to further increase my fund of informa- 
tion, I answered several advertisements that seemed 
to refer to the scheme I had taken in hand, In the 
financial column of a morning paper I found this : — 

A LADY OF TITLE wishes to borrow 
^1,000 for six months. Would act as chaperon 
to young lady. 

I wrote to the address given, repeating my American 
heiress story. I stated that I was looking for a 
chaperon, and was willing to give, instead of lend, 
£1^00 to the proper person. My answer came from 
a solicitor's office. It read : — 



The "Almighty Dollar!* 109 

" Madam, — My client, feeling:, as you do, the delicacy that exists in 
the matter, has handed to me your letter of the ioth inst., and has 
desired me to communicate with you thereon. There is no question 
that she is in a position to do what you desire ; and, as it is somewhat 
difficult to arrive at any conclusion by correspondence, I would suggest 
that you allow me to meet you with the view of thoroughly discussing 
the matter. I should be glad to see you either at my office or your 

house ; or, indeed, as ladies are admitted at the Club during the 

hour of afternoon tea, it might be convenient if the interview took 
place there, where, without any undue observation, I could arrange a 
meeting with my client." 

Other advertisements to which I replied were 
somewhat of this kind : — 

A LADY OF GOOD POSITION, speaking 
several languages, expects to spend the winter on 
the Continent, and is willing to chaperon one or two 
young girls and receive them into her home on her 
return to London. 

When I wrote to the advertisers, most of them 
stated that they would prefer an American girl to 
travel and live with them. 

At the beginning of my investigations. I did not 
start out with a lantern searching for an honest man ; 
but I think I found him by answering this advertise- 
ment : — 

A FAMILY OF GOOD POSITION will 
give Board and Residence to Young Lady in West- 
End. Will chaperon her if desired. 

In reply to the letter, in which I frankly confided 
all my social aspirations, I received a note that seemed 
likely to destroy one of the most valuable commercial 
qualities that I, as a journalist, had hitherto possessed 
— my cynicism. Here it is : — 

" Dear Madam, — Under the peculiar circumstances, I am sure it 
will be better that we commence our negotiations by showing mutual 
trust in each other. I therefore give you my full address and write ia 



no Campaigns of Curiosity. 

my own name, ., feeling sure that you will appreciate my motives, and 
keep the knowledge to yourself. You can readily understand that in 
our position we do not want the matter to become public property or 
the subject of talk. 

" My wife could, I think, introduce you into good English society, 
but not into titled society, which I know is aimed at by many American 
ladies, but in reality is only gained by the assistance of the needy 
nobility — mostly dowagers with small means and ' marketable handles ' 
to their names. 

" You, I think, will see that it is not practicable to give exact terms, 
as you asked for in your letter, without much more information than 
can be given in any letter, however explicit. Could you arrange, 
therefore, to call here at any time (we do not object to a Sunday) and 
see my wife and myself, when doubtless we might come to some pleasant 
arrangements and understanding ? " 

Oh, Diogenes ! what a pity you did not read the 
advertising columns of the morning papers ! 

With the exception of the one honest man whose 
letter I have quoted, none of those with whom 
I had negotiations refused to entertain my propo- 
sition, even when I acknowledged my deplorable 
lack of ancestry and proper family connections. The 
large fortune I represented myself as possessing 
seemed to cover a multitude of embarrassing cir- 
cumstances, if not positive sins. Had I carried my 
experiment further and been introduced and pre- 
sented at Court, I should only have been one of 
numerous Americans who have walked on a golden 
pavement to the Throne Room of Buckingham 
Palace. 



The ''Almighty Dollar' 1 hi 



CHAPTER IV. 

INTERESTING ANTECEDENTS. 

It may be of interest to English readers to know 
something concerning my countrywomen who have 
made a sensation during a London season. Many 
of them are unknown, or at least unrecognised, by the 
best American society. 

Take Miss Porkolis, for example, the Western 

girl whom Lady spoke of having chaperoned. 

Her grandfather was interested in the lard business, 
and who her great-grandfather was history sayeth 
not. The present Mr. Porkolis has retired to a 
country house and lives on his income. When Miss 
Porkolis was introduced to London society she was 
even in a worse state than I represented myself to 
be ; for not only were the members of her family 
unrefined and uneducated, but the young lady herself 
made the most startling blunders in grammar and 

spelling. No wonder that Lady , in considering 

my proposition, made the proviso that I myself must 
be possessed of some refinement and education. She 
was doubtless thinking of the many embarrassments 
she suffered during the career of Miss Porkolis ! 

There were the Cole-Kings, two sisters, chaperoned 
by a well-known social star. Both were beautiful, 
fascinating, and wealthy. They were from the Wild 
West, but were educated in an Eastern seminary, and 
then sent to a " finishing school " to be polished off. 
The polishing process lasted over two years ; and 
then, after a vain attempt to number themselves 
among the New York " Four Hundred," they made 



ii2 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

a trip over the Continent, and turned up in London 
in time for the festivities of the season. 

The Diamondsons came over en famille, and 
entertained magnificently in London not a dozen 
years ago. Everybody went to their " crushes," be- 
cause with them money seemed to be no object. In 
speaking of the British and American monetary 
system one time, Mr. Diamondson was heard to re- 
mark that, although he generally thought in dollars, 
he would just as soon pay out pounds as dollars, as it 
was simply a matter of multiplication by five anyhow. 
So when Miss Evelyn Diamondson wanted a dress 
from Messrs. Swagger and Swell, it made no differ- 
ence to her adoring father whether it cost one hundred 
dollars or one hundred pounds. It was, then, not 
surprising that, with all their recklessness as regarded 
the expenditure of money, the Diamondsons became 
immensely popular. Their daughter almost married 
a man of high degree in England, and then quite 
married a titled foreigner — a harmless sort of person, 
who contentedly spends the income allowed him by 
his father-in-law. 

I could give a long list of my recently Anglicised 
countrypeople who in England are mistakenly looked 
upon as fair specimens of America's best citizens. 
There are the Snobsons, of wheat farm fame ; the 
Candlemans, who grew opulent on the proceeds 
of their tallow and fat business ; and the Welldiggers, 
who awoke one morning to find themselves mil- 
lionaires, one of the " hired men " having " struck 
oil" on the outskirts of the farm after the rest of 
the family had gone to bed. Mr. Welldigger took 
the hired man into partnership, and proposed that 



The "Almighty Dollar? 113 

he should marry Angel ica, his only daughter. But 
Angelica positively declined, having made up her 
mind to cross the ocean and marry a title, which 
she did, and greatly to her credit too, for never a 
girl fished harder with gilded bait than did Angelica. 

The prevalence of French names and hyphens 
among the signatures of rich Americans has often 
been remarked upon. About the first thing that 
occurs to a man with newly-acquired wealth and 
social aspirations is to make some sort of change in 
his name, if it happens to be an unfashionable one, 
which is often the case. If Patrick Rafferty becomes 
a millionaire by a sudden speculation, either he or his 
wife will immediately discover that the family is really 
of French origin, and that the name should be pro- 
nounced Raffertay, with the accent on the last syllable ; 
while if Luther Jones determines to attempt to scale 
the social ladder in London, he will have new cards 
engraved, which will read thus : " Mr. Luther-Jones." 
Then the French " de " is also quite popular among 
our would-be aristocrats, and such names as "de 
Brown " and " de Smithers " are considered quite the 
thing for a family about to make a European trip. 

And yet, " what's in a name ? " So far as 
society is concerned, the daughters of the men I have 
mentioned would have experienced no difficulty in 
finding chaperons to introduce them in London even if 
their names had been plain Jones or Smithers, so long 
as they paid the price, which I have discovered is 
made according to the advantages offered. 

So, after all my investigations, my faith in the 
purchasing power of the " Almighty Dollar " stiU 
remains unshaken. 
I 



THE PRICE OF A PEDIGREE. 



WHEN General Harrison was running for the Presi- 
dency, the members of the opposition party looked 
about for a slur to cast upon him. Finally, they 
brought forward an accusation of the gravest possible 
kind. It was that the poor man had a grandfather, 
which, being altogether un-American, proved conclu- 
sively that he ought never to be elected President of 
the United States. During that campaign many good 
Democrats put the pictures of their ancestors away 
in the attic, or turned them with faces towards the 
wall, in order to escape the imputation of being 
traitors to Democratic principles. In certain circles 
it was looked upon as nothing short of a crime to 
have a family-tree and to be able to tell with any 
degree of certainty from which branch one had 
sprouted. 

I do not know whether General Harrison's elec- 
tion had anything to do with making grandfathers 
more popular, but for the past few years I have noticed 
that not only grandfathers, but ancestors removed 
many generations back, were getting immensely 
fashionable, especially among people of suddenly- 
acquired wealth. It has often occurred to me that 
there must be some sort of mill or shop where fore- 
fathers and coats-of-arms were made to order. I 
have known persons who one month wrote on plain 

I 2 



n6 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

note-paper, drove in hired hansoms, and had the 
walls of the " parlour " adorned with chromos, who 
the next month indited notes on stationery embossed 
with strangely-wrought characters in gold and bronze 
and purple, and invited their friends to call at a new 
house, where, on the drawing-room walls, hung old- 
fashioned gilded frames, from which stared cracked 
and battered portraits of men and women of ancient 
times. I have always noticed that the advent of 
these things was simultaneous with a rise in the price 
of pork, the finding of a new mine, or a hitherto 
undiscovered oil-well. 

Some years ago a young New York lawyer, who, 
had he lived in England, would have been known as 
a " briefless barrister," confided to me that he wished 
to go to one of the Western States and start in his 
profession, but he was kept back for the lack of a few 
hundred dollars. He was clever, talented, and had 
boundless ambition, the sort of man that always 
rises in America. He had been an only son, but his 
parents had left him no legacy, except an honoured 
name and a family-tree of considerable dimensions. 
One day, in talking over his resources, a sudden 
thought occurred to him, and his face brightened. 

" Do you know," said he, " it seems as if those 
ancestors of mine ought to be worth something to me 
in a crisis like this ! " 

"But they're not," I answered. "You know 
they're as dead as a door-nail. There's nothing for 
you but to go and saw wood." 

Still he persisted that ancestors were ^realisable 
assets, if he could only find a market for them, and ex- 
plained that many a rich man would be glad to own 



The Price of a Pedigree. 117 

such a pedigree and coat-of-arms as he possessed. 
The next day he brought a parcel of papers, which 
contained a full account of his genealogy, a descrip- 
tion of his ancestral halls, and a crest of no mean 
order ; and, going over them, he made it clear to me 
just how, with a few slight changes, everything 
might be made to apply to almost any person and 
fit the case exactly. 

At first I was shocked, and could not enter into 
the spirit of the thing, though I could not but admire 
his resourceful mind. There seemed to be something 
uncanny and sacrilegious about selling off one's fore- 
father's like that, and I told him so, comparing him 
to Esau, who sold his birthright for a mess of 
pottage. 

I went to South America soon afterwards, and 
thought no more about the affair until three or four 
months ago I received a marked copy of a Western 
paper, which spoke of the fame recently achieved by 
a rising young lawyer, who was one of the coming 
men of the great West. It was my old-time friend, 
and I fell to wondering whether he had realised a 
sufficient amount on his pedigree to enable him to 
make the start he wanted. I wrote, asking him if he 
had succeeded in disposing of his heritage, and also 
desired him to give me any additional information he 
could in regard to modern genealogical matters. A 
few weeks later I had a letter from him, stating that, 
soon after I left New York, he had found a buyer for 
his wares in the person of a wealthy citizen of 
Dakota, who, happening to have the same name as 
his own (which was not an uncommon one), paid 
him $800 down cash, and was not even put to the 



ii 8 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

trouble of making any changes. At the close of his 
letter he wrote : — 

"You probably have not heard that the Highfliers, of Wyoming, 
have suddenly come out with a coat-of-arms and weird-looking old oil- 
paintings. I have taken the pains to investigate it for you, and I under- 
stand that they had some private person, who lives hear London, to 
attend to the matter for them. The coat-of-arms is not genuine, I am 
sure, and the paintings, though doubtless somebody's ancestors, are 
not their own. You might go and see the man in the interest of your 

profession. His address is . As for myself, I am getting on 

swimmingly since I sold my birthright, and when anyone inquires into 
the details of my forbears, I put them off with the quotation : 

" ' The rank is but the guinea stamp, 
The man's the man for a' that.' " 

The place indicated was in one of the suburbs of 
London, and I called twice at the address before I 
found the person I sought. The gentility and un- 
pretentious bearing of the house I visited rather dis- 
appointed me ; for I half-expected to see a shop with 
crests, stamps, and trees displayed in the window, and 
suspended over the door some such sign as " Pedi- 
grees While You Wait." 

The man who answered to the name my friend 
had given me was also a disappointment. He 
did not have the appearance of a manufacturer of 
ancestors and armorial ensigns. He was a thorough 
gentleman, but not like an Englishman. He seemed 
to be of German extraction, though he spoke without 
an accent. 

I explained that I was an American, and was 
anxious to obtain some information concerning my 
father's people, who were English. I gave my name 
as Miss Helen Simpkins. I think the name must 
have discouraged him at once ; for he put on an 



The Price of a Pedigree. 119 

exceedingly doubtful look, as if wondering whether 
any good could come out of the Simpkinses or, rather, 
if the Simpkinses could have come out of any good. 
The name certainly did not have an aristocratic ring 
about it. That was why I gave it. I thought it quite 
as good as Highflier, and likely to bring about just as 
satisfactory results. 

" Simpkins, Simpkins," he repeated in a musing 
sort of way. " Is that an old English name ? " 

" I don't know how old it is," I answered, " but it is 
my name, and my father's people were English. I want 
to find out who they were and what they were. I 
understand that you make investigations of this kind 
for Americans." 

" Yes," he answered, with the semblance of a smile. 
" I have sometimes done that, as I am interested in 
the study of genealogy and the subject of heredity, 
though I do not make a business of it. Yet I have 
helped some of your country people in that way." 

" How much does it cost ? " I asked bluntly. 

" Well, my charge, of course, depends upon the 
trouble I am obliged to take. I suppose you have 
some information to give me concerning your grand- 
father, great-grandfather, where they lived, whether 
they were what is known as gentlemen, and when 
they went to America ? It may be a very simple 
matter, in which case the cost would be trifling — not 
more than five or six guineas." 

He seemed so genuine, so honest, and withal such 
a gentleman, that I began to believe he never could 
have helped the Highfliers in their quest of a lineage 

"You see," said I, " my father and mother are not 
living, and, as I am the only member of the family, I 



120 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

have no means of finding out anything concerning 
my father's ancestors, except that I know his father 
was named Samuel Simpkins and lived somewhere in 
England. I thought you could hunt all that up for 
me ; and I was prepared to pay you for your trouble, 
whatever you might ask." 

I spoke in a melancholy, innocent sort of tone, 
and my auditor smiled good-naturedly, as he said : 

" I am afraid I could not do anything with such 
vague information as you have at your command, 
even though you gave me a thousand pounds. We 
must have something to start on, and you have 
nothing. If you are a wealthy American lady, as I 
suppose you are, I would not, if I were you, bother 
myself about questions of this sort. Indeed, you have 
no necessity to trouble about ancestors. To be an 
American woman is honour enough." 

He was so very kind and so American-like in his 
gallantry, that I felt like confessing myself a sham ; 
but the thought of Henrietta Highflier, and all the 
airs she had doubtless assumed with her new-found 
dignity, induced me to make another effort before 
giving up. 

"I am so sorry ; I thought you could help me. I 
understood that you did something for the Highfliers, 
of Wyoming. Did Mr. Highflier know anything more 
about his grandfathers than I know about mine ? " 

He smiled when I mentioned the name of High- 
flier. 

" Yes, I did put myself to considerable trouble for 
the Highfliers," he answered ; " but theirs was a pecu- 
liar case." 

" Mine is also a peculiar case. It is not pleasant 



The Price of a Pedigree. 121 

to know nothing about one's people. I have come to 
England purposely to find out, and I don't like to go 
back to America with no more information than when 
I came. I am willing to pay anything you ask for 
the trouble I make you. I have no one to care what 
I do with my money." I was anxious to get away 
from this very pleasant man, but still I must know 
about the Highfliers. 

" Is it then for America only that you wish a coat- 
of-arms and a genealogical-table? You do not 
intend to remain in England or on the Continent ? " 

"Yes, I want something to show my American 
friends, a crest for the brougham and stamp for my 
note paper. I do not expect to stop in England after 
this month," was my reply. 

"Very well," he said. "I can supply you with 
what you seem to want for two hundred pounds, if 
you desire to spend your money so foolishly. I will 
be perfectly honest with you and tell you that it will 
be better for you to use the crest only in America 
where people will not put it to a close scrutiny. 
You had best think the matter over before you 
decide. You look intelligent and I think you can 
understand my position in the matter. I am always 
honourable in my dealings." 

"Did you arrange it that way for the Highfliers?" 
I asked, making my final stroke, as I prepared to 
leave. 

" I am hardly at liberty to answer your question," 
he replied with great dignity. 

He shook hands, and bowed me out in a kindly, 
fatherly sort of way. I could not help but admire 
the genuineness of the man who did not attempt to 



122 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

pass off a sham thing for a real. If rich Americans 
were willing to pay him a thousand dollars for draw- 
ing original pictures of trees, animals, and coronets 
and making a list of names on paper or attaching 
them to the branches of an apple-tree, knowing the 
while that they were pictures only, nobody could 
blame him for amusing himself and accepting the 
money. 

After my interview with the man who did the 
Highfliers such an inestimable service, I discovered 
another person in the City who, without troubling 
me with embarrassing questions concerning the 
Simpkinses of a past age, would undertake to provide 
me with a noble line of ancestors extending back 
several generations, his charges to be according to the 
length of the line. This was reasonable enough ; for, 
of course, the larger the number of ancestors, the 
more time and thought spent in the investigation, or 
manufacture, as the case might be. I considered 
this plan of supplying forefathers at so much a head 
the only true business-like way of carrying out such 
a transaction. If I cared for a pedigree to begin 
with the thirteenth, fourteenth, or fifteenth century, 
the price would naturally be higher than one which 
started in the seventeenth or eighteenth century. 
The lowest price for which any investigation would 
be undertaken was £50, while a coat-of-arms would 
be " authenticated " for £\o extra. I presume that 
this price would be increased if I demanded anything 
of a very elaborate order. 

Those who study the advertising columns of the 
daily papers have doubtless often noticed the adver- 
tisement of a "private gentleman," who advises 



The Price of a Pedigree, 123 

Americans and others that he is prepared to authen- 
ticate pedigrees and emblazon escutcheons at reason- 
able terms. Many of my countrypeople who visit 
London during the season have received from this 
gentleman neatly-engraved cards, stating that he 
makes a speciality of the study of heraldry in connec- 
tion with the stationery business. He says that 
many Americans, though they know it not, can 
really trace their families back to the blood royal of 
England. But this gentleman's customers are not all 
Americans. He has been patronised by numbers of 
City men and tradespeople of London, who, with the 
acquisition of wealth made in stockbroking or the 
drapery trade, feel a sudden craving for knowledge of 
their ancestry. Many of them are so deceived by the 
pedigree-maker that they believe the strange, weird 
tales he tells them, while others are satisfied to make 
their neighbours believe them. 

The genealogies thus supplied are probably quite 
as genuine as many of those collected together in 
certain books relating to the existing gentle and noble 
families of England. In looking over these publica- 
tions, I have often been struck with the fact that 
nearly all the pedigrees commence with the time of 
Conquest, and I have been surprised to find that 
nearly everybody worth mentioning had ancestors 
who were " close friends " of William the Conqueror. 
It is wonderful the number of intimate companions 
that crusty old invader had ! According to the 
genealogical records, they were more numerous than 
the sands of the desert. In some of these pedigrees 
there seem to have been at times several generations 
that got lost in some unaccountable way, so that in 



124 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

many instances it would appear that certain men 
must have been the sons of their great-great-grand- 
fathers, unless, like Topsy, they "just growed." Such 
discrepancies as these are doubtless due to the 
stupidity of pedigree-makers who lived two or three 
centuries ago, and they have been allowed to go on 
uncorrected. Nineteenth-century genealogists know 
their business better, and they go on the principle 
that " what is worth doing at all is worth doing well;" 
hence a pedigree now made to order reads smoothly 
and consistently, and the possessor may congratulate 
himself on the fact that he is able to secure the very 
latest thing in this line. 

Some genealogists have been known to show a 
sense of the eternal fitness of things by supplying their 
customers with crests and arms to suit their particular 
vocations. A few years ago a wealthy Chicago pork- 
dealer, who had expressed his willingness to pay a 
large sum of money for a crest and family-tree, was 
much insulted on receiving a sheet of paper stamped 
with a picture of three wild boars standing on their 
hind legs. He refused to pay for it on the ground 
that it was too personal, and now his carriage panels 
are ornamented with a crest of an entirely different 
character. If people would only be more consistent 
in such matters, the art of heraldry might be put to 
much greater use than it is at present ; but consistency 
is so costly a jewel that there are few who can afford 
to wear it. How convenient it would be if Miss 
Brewer, of Milwaukee, would have the top of her 
note-paper embellished with a drawing of a brightly- 
coloured cask or barrel ! On the family plate of the 
wealthy Dakota farmer might be engraved a sheaf of 



The Price of a Pedigree. 125 

wheat, while the escutcheon of the Pennsylvania 
coal baron could be adorned with a representation of 
a glowing furnace. 

In these days of the " new woman," the " new jour- 
nalism," the "new drama," and the "new art," I am 
surprised that someone does not invent something 
original in the way of pedigrees, and call it the " new 
heraldry." Cannot a man be found who is bold 
and honest enough to start his pedigree in the latter 
part of the nineteenth century, commencing with him- 
self, and taking for his coat-of-arms the symbol of his 
own trade or profession? Such a course would be 
the only proper one for so-called " self-made " men to 
adopt, both in England and America. In such a case, 
a very appropriate motto would be " Every Man His 
Own Ancestor." 

But until such a person comes forward, I suppose 
we shall have to put up with such improvements and 
conveniences as we already have, which, after all, 
are not to be despised. "Made ancestors" possess 
peculiar advantages over the genuine articles, inas- 
much as they m. y be manufactured at notice to suit 
all tastes and requirements. Then, too, the plan, to 
a great extent, does away with the family skeletons 
of a past generation, which are always liable to pop 
up at inopportune times and create embarrassments. 
According to the present method, anybody with 
money may be descended from knights, earls, dukes, 
and even kings, all of the best variety and irreproach- 
able character. Crests of colours and designs most 
pleasing to the eye may always be obtained, and the 
coat of mail that stands in the hall may be ever 
bright and new. 



126 Campaigns of Curiosity, 

Those plebeians who insist on pedigrees of ancient 
date may be accommodated by entering into negotia- 
tions with the aristocratic poor of all countries, and 
even persons with genealogies and crests of their own 
are privileged to have them altered and rearranged 
at pleasure. In this connection I am reminded of 
the story of a Boston lady, who, visiting London 
recently, decided to go to a sort of private heraldic 
bureau and have her ancestors hunted up. It 
transpired that the lady was really of noble lineage, 
but when she was shown the coat-of-arms which 
had belonged to her family centuries ago, she nearly 
fainted at the sight of the snakes and lizards that 
formed a prominent part of the crest. She declared 
that she hated " crawling things," and demanded a 
new one. The man of heralds tried to explain to 
her that the snakes and lizards were only symbols, 
but all to no effect, and he was finally obliged to 
make her a new coat-of-arms, in which frisking grey- 
hounds took the place of the objectionable features. 

It must, however, be admitted that the present 
system has its drawbacks as well as its conveniences, 
in that the owners of genuine crests are never safe in 
their possessions. If a neighbour admires the style 
and design, there seems to be nothing to prevent his 
having it copied, with, perhaps, a very small differ- 
ence as regards details. It is said that an English 
diplomat, who some years ago resided in America, 
ordered from a Washington manufacturer a new 
brougham, with the instruction that on the panels 
should be painted his coat-of-arms. A few weeks 
later, on visiting the carriage shop, he found that 
several new turn-outs were standing about, emblazoned 



The Price of a Pedigree. 127 

in the same way as the one he ordered. He thought, 
perhaps, the manufacturer was intending to make 
him a present. 

" Are these all mine ? " he asked. 

" Oh, no ! " answered the manufacturer. " Some 
of my customers so much admired the picture on 
your brougham that they decided to have it copied 
on their own carriages. Rather a compliment to 
your taste, I take ! " This story, however, is given 
more credence in England than in the 'United 
States. 

I have found that none of the pedigree " shops " 
are entirely patronised by Americans. Many of 
their customers are to be found among the English 
middle classes. Snobs are not indigenous to republics. 
They are quite as numerous in monarchies. 

There are certain people who do not care to 
patronise the " shops," preferring rather to carry on 
their transactions privately. It is mostly in this way 
that those persons who have a family backing and no 
money are enabled to meet others who have the 
money but no backing, and so they make a fair 
exchange, which is no robbery. 

Since my investigation into this matter, 1 have 
begun to have a strangely suspicious feeling about 
some of my personal acquaintances, who, it has often 
occurred to me, talk more than is really necessary 
concerning their noble or gentle descent. I have 
even grown cynical as regards the thorough-bredness 
of my black poodle, whom I had hitherto looked 
upon as being descended from a long line of patrician 
Parisians. Now, whenever I notice him attempting to 
show any superiority over the unkempt mongrel that 



128 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

he passes on the street, I push back the fringe that 
hangs about his face and looking him in the eyes, 
say, " Dear old doggie ! you must not be vain 
because of your supposed high-born condition, for 
I have discovered that there are Pedigrees FOR 
All." 



SWEEPING A CROSSING, 



" Spare a copper ! Spare a copper ! " Every 
Londoner knows the hackneyed phrase. Walking 
one day from Oxford Circus to Charing Cross, I 
heard it fourteen times. " Help a poor chap ! " 
" Pity an old sweep ! " These were the variations 
which occasionally broke the monotony of the 
appeal. Into each outstretched hand I dropped a 
copper, while fourteen separate and distinct blessings 
were called down upon my head. When I reached 
the Strand I found I had distributed just twelve 
pence and a halfpenny, and I could have taken a 
hansom for a shilling! It was easy for me to 
understand why so many pedestrians were obliged 
to shake their heads at the importunities of the 
sweeps. It would be much cheaper to ride than 
to walk if one should hand to each sweep a penny 
or even a halfpenny, and cabs would be a matter 
of economy. Only the rich can afford to walk and 
be generous — or shall I say just ? For, to my mind, 
it is a question whether people have a right to keep 
their boots clean on a muddy day without paying 
the man who makes it possible for them to walk 
dryshod across the street. I hold that the sweep 
is not a beggar, but a man of business, however 
humble his line of operations may be. When I 
walk over his cleanly-swept pathway with unsullied 
J 



130 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

skirts and boots I give him a penny as payment 
for value received, and in such cases a penny spent 
is two or three shillings saved in cleaners' bills. 

The sweep is not only a man of business, he is 
often something of an artist. He has developed 
cross-sweeping into one of the fine arts, and no 
one can but admire the geometrical symmetry of 
his work. The straight lines stretching from corner 
to corner, the circles and right-angled triangles which 
he traces along the principal thoroughfares, often 
transform an ugly crossing into a thing of beauty. 
I have often wondered that some of the more skilful 
do not use their talents in a more remunerative 
profession, although wonderful tales have been told 
of members of the craft who have grown wealthy 
with plying the broom for a quarter of a century. 
Strange stories of men who swept crossings on week- 
days and rode in private broughams on Sundays are 
floating about London. A particularly interesting 
legend is that of an old man who for many years 
swept a crossing in the neighbourhood of Maryle- 
bone Road. He himself lived in cheap West-End 
lodgings, but his family had their country house, 
and fared sumptuously. Two or three times a year 
he visited them and made an impression on his 
neighbours with his always up-to-date method of 
dressing. His frock-coat and top-hat were of the 
latest make and fashion. When he died there were 
several thousand pounds to his credit in the bank. 
Among the ranks of crossing-sweeps the story will 
doubtless be handed down from father to son as 
an example o f what an ambitious sweep may do if 
he will. 



Sweeping a Crossing. 131 

With an ever-inquiring mind that leads me often- 
times into the amateur detective service in order to 
get at the bottom of things, the idea of playing the 
role of a crossing-sweep came to me as a matter of 
course. I would thus have an opportunity to find 
out if it were really true, as some people assert, that 
hundreds of London sweeps are growing opulent at 
the expense of poor but kind-hearted pedestrians. 

With this in mind, I stopped to interview an old 
woman who for the past several years has kept her 
position on Portland Place, in the vicinity of the 
Langham Hotel. I first took the precaution to give 
her a goodly number of pennies ere I proceeded to 
draw her out on the merits and demerits of her 
chosen calling. She smiled propitiously, and then 
I asked if I might hire her crossing for two hours 
in the afternoon at the rate of a shilling an hour. 
I had expected she would reply "Yes, lady. Thank 
you, lady," and hand me over her broom and stool 
without further parleying, but, to my astonishment, 
she eyed me suspiciously and demanded sternly, 
" What's yer motive ? " I could not reply to her as 
I had recently done to a London editor, who, when I 
had proposed to him a subject for a sensational story, 
put to me the same question. Then I had answered 
candidly, " Why, to get copy, of course." I could not 
thus take the old woman into my confidence. 

"What difference can it make about my motive 
so long as you get your money ? " I asked. " See, 
you may have it in advance," and I held the shining 
coins temptingly before her. 

She shook her head. 

" I wants to know yer motive. Ye looks a fine 
J 2 



132 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

lady, but ye might be wantin' to take the bread out 
of my mouth ! " 

And so it was true that there were tricks in all 
trades, street-sweeping included ! How, indeed, was 
she to know that I was not a would-be member of 
her craft passing myself off for a benevolent lady ? 
Might I not have a deep-laid scheme to hire her 
stand for a couple of hours, and then " do " her out 
of her means of livelihood for the rest of her days ? 

" How much money did you take in yesterday ? " 
I asked. 

" Only ninepence, lady, enough to buy sugar and 
tea and bread, and the landlord was askin' me for 
the rent," she answered in a whining voice. 

" Was that a good day's earnings ? " 

" Yes, lady ; but sometimes I takes a shillin' or 
one and tuppence." 

" Did you ever get two shillings in a day?" 

" No, lady, never." 

" Then why not take the money and let me have 
the crossing from three to five o'clock ? Whatever 
pennies I receive I'll give you to-morrow morning." 

My words were smooth and my tones seductive, 
but all to no avail. 

"No, my lady. It do look queer, and I wouldn't 
let ye have it for no amount. Ye can't get a crossing 
from anybody unless ye tells more about yersclf." 

She picked up her broom and began wielding 
it excitedly over the pavement. Dismissed thus un- 
ceremoniously, I decided to go out sweeping on my 
own account, and commence operations wherever I 
could. An hour later I emerged from my area gate 
arrayed in the most suitable garments I could find 



Sweeping a Crossing. 133 

about the house. Underneath my bodice, for warmth 
and inspiration, I wrapped about me a copy of the 
Times. I wore the black serge dress that had done 
duty a few months previous, when I held rhe re- 
sponsible position of parlourmaid in Kensington, an 
old light coat, not of the newest cut, and a black 
cashmere shawl folded into a tippet for my neck. 
My head-covering was an old felt hat which had the 
appearance of having been through violent spasms 
and contortions. In order to disguise myself as 
much as possible until I could get out of my own 
neighbourhood, I had drawn a thick black veil over 
my face. Bearing in mind the story I had heard 
of the wealthy sweep of Marylebone Road, I wended 
my way towards the goal of his wondrous success. 
I hurried along Harley Street and turned off into 
the Marylebone Road, dragging my newly-purchased 
brushwood broom after me. My costume was not 
quite the orthodox thing for a sweep. The white 
jacket must have looked somewhat peculiar and out 
of place. What wonder that the butcher and baker 
boys hooted me as I passed at a rapid gait ! " See 
the dandy sweep ! Has yer got a licence, missus ?" 
one of them called after me. No, I had not a licence ; 
but I knew there were many other sweeps who also 
did not possess that important document, and I did 
not falter. A little fox-terrier, out for his morning 
constitutional, sniffed scornfully and barked fero- 
ciously at my heels, and such incidents tended only 
to quicken my pace. 

At last I found a crossing over which there seemed 
to be no presiding genius, but I no sooner com- 
menced operations than an angry-looking individual 




"MY COSTUME WAS NOT QUITE ORTHODOX." 

(trom a Photograph by the London Stereoscopic Company.} 



Sweeping a Crossing. 135 

appeared, broom in hand, and shook it in my face. 
" Hi, there ! what ye doing with my pitch ? Ye'd 
better move on." As I did not know just what 
was the etiquette in vogue between members of the 
sweep brigade, I concluded it better to move on, and 
proceeded to Baker Street Station. 

Many people were passing to and fro, and I 
thought it might be well to make a pathway of my 
own, a brand new one that no one could claim. I 
plied my broom most vigorously right and left, and 
did my best to clear a footroad across the mud for 
the patrons of the Underground Railway. In spite of 
my efforts, my work showed amateurishness. The 
style of broom I had chosen was an awkward one for 
me to handle, and for a while I only succeeded in 
spattering mud about. After great trouble and per- 
severance I made a path which looked as if a snake 
had wriggled across the road, and left a scalloped 
track behind him. When I stepped back upon the 
pavement to view my handiwork I felt that I had 
really earned a few pennies, for the route I had made 
was useful and ornamental as well. 

The railway passengers began to cross over, but I 
did not hold out my hand for coppers, neither did I 
importune any one. I had determined to stand on all 
the dignity I had left, feeling that the labourer was 
worthy of his hire. People walked on my crossing, 
but nobody offered me payment. They took particular 
pains to keep themselves in the path, even in its most 
waggly parts. I began to despise them, and in my 
heart I called them paupers, to patronise my crossing 
and not be willing to pay for the privilege. They had 
no more right to take advantage of the track 1 had 



136 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

prepared than they had to go into a restaurant and 
eat a dinner for which they refused to pay. I felt 
that they were the beggars, not I. In my opinion, 
there was but one alternative for the person who was 
unwilling or unable to pay, and that was to go round 
on the outside through the mud. There was only 
one man who seemed to give the matter a thought. 
He put his hand into his pocket and pulled out a 
penny, then put it back again. He had probably 
expected to contribute a halfpenny, and found that he 
had not that coin in his possession. 

In an hour I had become disgusted with the Baker 
Street Station neighbourhood, and I had grave doubts 
concerning the truthfulness of the wealthy sweep story. 
I could see no chance of riding in broughams or keep- 
ing country houses if I stuck to cross-sweeping in that 
vicinity, so I pulled my shawl about me, trying as best 
I could to cover up my white coat, and dragged my 
broom to Regent Street. I attracted little attention 
as I walked from Oxford Circus to Piccadilly. It was 
about one o'clock and many of the crossings were 
deserted. The sweeps were perhaps taking lunch. 
No one presided over the Vigo Street crossing, and I 
took up my stand there. But I did not attempt to 
sweep, thinking that, if the owner of the crossing 
suddenly made his appearance, I could deny any 
accusations he might make against my honesty by 
saying that I had simply stopped to rest a bit. 

As I leaned on my broom I became intensely in- 
terested in the people who passed me. It was gloomy, 
muddy, and wet, and 1 took it for granted that those 
who walked on such a day walked because they could 
not afford to ride. A woman journalist of some fame 



Sweeping a Crossing. 137 

but small fortune went by, clasping an envelope, which 
from its size and appearance I felt quite positive must 
contain manuscript. I did not ask her for a copper, 
for I was somehow under the impression that she was 
carrying her copy to Fleet Street because she had no 
stamps to send it by post. 

" Belong here?" asked a man, sidling up to me. 
I recognised him as a sweep from across the way. 

" Oh, no, I'm only resting," I answered wearily. 

" It's hard times," he continued with an attempt 
at being sociable. " I've only took in tuppence to- 
day, but I've done some big splashing on the rest of 
'em." 

" Splashing ! What for ? " I asked. 

" Well, ye must be a new un if ye don't know that 
trick ! When I asks a man or a woman for a copper 
and they doesn't give it, I just splashes 'em ; that's 
all." 

What a pity I had not heard that before I took 
my stand near Baker Street Station ! 

The sweep went back to his stand, and I continued 
to view the procession of bedrabbled humanity that 
passed me. " Poor girl ! " I heard someone say in 
pitying tones, and, looking up, I saw a much-painted 
and powdered, gaudily-dressed woman near me. 
" Take this," and she thrust a threepenny-bit into my 
hand. I managed to stammer out " Thank-you " as 
she sauntered on. It needed not a second look to tell 
me the class to which she belonged. Society, the 
pulpit, and the press number her among the " fallen." 
I have since been told that it is from these women 
that crossing-sweeps obtain most of their pennies. 

About two o'clock the rain began to fall, and, as I 



138 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

was not provided with an umbrella, I feared that a 
prolonged experiment in the street-sweeping line 
might unfit me for future explorations in various 
directions, so I turned my face homewards, with only 
the threepenny-bit as the result of my morning's 
work. 

I have since taken the trouble to interview between 
twenty and thirty sweeps on the subject of taking out 
licences. I find that the majority of them do not 
approve of the licence system, which asks them to 
invest five shillings before they commence business. 
The matter of the licence is often neglected — perhaps 
I should say forgotten — till a policeman or other 
official gives them a gentle reminder. 

I have also attempted to inspire them with a sense 
of the dignity of their calling, and have found it rather 
a difficult task, although they all agree with me that 
people who patronise their crossings should pay for it. 
Some of them have confidentially admitted that the 
stories of suffering wives, and children down with the 
measles or scarlet-fever, are invented to reach the sym- 
pathies of the public ; but they justify themselves in the 
belief that they are doing evil that good may come, and 
that what pennies they receive are given in charity. 
I have recommended to them that they get some sort 
of halfpenny-in-the-slot machine and place it in such 
a position that passers-by must see it and feel it 
incumbent upon them to contribute a halfpenny. 

I am sure that such an arrangement would serve 
the purpose much better than the present method of 
collecting their dues. 



A DAY WITH THE FLOWER-GIRLS. 



'VIOLETS, sweet violets! A penny a bunch !" From 
ten o'clock in the morning until the first hour of 
midnight this cry of the flower-sellers may be heard 
in the London streets. It usually issues from female 
throats, although occasionally the clamour is rein- 
forced by a masculine voice, which, however, could 
scarcely be more unpleasant or less musical than the 
voices of the women ; for they are not a pre- 
possessing set of women in any respect, these London 
retailers of Flora's treasures. Dirty, coarse-featured, 
harsh-spoken, with draggled skirts, ragged shawls 
and befeathered hats of the latest coster style, they 
seem ill-suited to be the vendors of velvety violets 
and waxen lilies. Travellers who have seen the 
Continental flower-girls in their bright, picturesque 
costumes that, in point of attractiveness, vie with the 
blossoms they offer to passers-by, cannot help but 
wish that the street-corners and circuses of gloomy 
London might also be thus enlivened. In accordance 
with the law of the eternal fitness of things, it is 
proper enough that those who brush our streets and 
sweep our chimneys should be muddy and grimy, 
but there is something incongruous in the sight of 
an unkempt, vicious-looking female, handling and 
selling beautiful flowers, while in shrill, clarion 
tones she tells us that she has " Lubly biolets, English 



140 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

biolets. No furrin biolets without a smell, is these, 
mum ! " I am convinced that smiles and fame and 
a fortune await the dainty dealer in boutonnieres, who, 
attractive herself, and attractively attired, will take 
her stand for a few weeks at Oxford, Piccadilly, or 
Ludgate Circus. 

To discover something of the ins and outs and 
the ups and downs of flower-selling, and to investi- 
gate into the ways of living and the aims and 
ambitions of the London flower-girls, I spent a 
Saturday in February among them. Had my object 
been the establishment of a new dynasty of flower- 
sellers, I should only too gladly have attired myself 
after the manner of the Italian girls, and have turned 
into a living London reality my notion of the ideal 
flower-girl. But under the circumstances I thought 
it better to leave the introduction of the new order 
to some other daring spirit, while taking for myself 
the much more difficult and unpleasant task of 
searching after the merits and demerits of the 
present race. 

I chose Saturday for my exploit, thinking that 
matinee afternoon must naturally be the harvest- 
time of the week. At eight o'clock in the morning, 
arrayed in black dress, black shawl, and brown straw 
hat trimmed with pink roses, I visited the Covent 
Garden Flower Market to make my purchases at 
wholesale rates. Having, in the privacy of my own 
house, tried the effect of a great, heavy, cumbersome 
basket, such as is commonly used, dangling from 
my neck, I decided that it was far too ugly and 
weighty for me to handle ; so I carried in its stead 
a light round basket, and tied it about my neck with 



A Day with the F lower-Girls. 141 

a ribbon. When I arrived, the proprietors of the 
various stalls in the market were doing a thriving 
business. Scores of coster-women, with the appear- 
ance of having been neither washed nor combed since 
they got out of bed, were rushing about from stall 
to stall, bent on discovering where they could buy 
the most flowers for the least money. " How much ? " 
they would ask, snatching a cluster of lilies or hya- 
cinths from a box and holding it in the face of the 
dealer. On being told the price, their faces would 
contort into a fiendish scowl, as they answered, " Go 
'long ! What yer sayin' ? Don't ye want me to make 
no prufifit ? " 

The flower market usually closes shortly after 
nine o'clock, and it is between eight and nine — in 
order to have their wares as fresh as possible — that 
the girls make their daily purchases. I followed 
several of them about the place while they were 
in pursuit of their bargains. Their manners and 
language were something of a revelation to me. I 
had expected to find them coarse and rough, but 
I was not prepared for such obscene and profane 
talk as I heard. With many, all semblance of 
womanly modesty seemed to be a thing of the 
long-gone past. They swore at each other and 
coquetted with the market men. While holding 
out their aprons to receive the flowers for which they 
had paid, they would slyly pass their hands into 
boxes in their vicinity and take possession of many 
a bunch for which they had not paid. I afterwards 
learned that this habit of petty thievery among them 
is one of their greatest sources of profit, for the sales 
of flowers thus obtained are, of course, all gain. 



142 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

On the morning in question violets sold whole- 
sale at the rate of sixpence and eightpence a dozen 
bunches ; lilies of the valley were tenpence a dozen 
sprays. 

When the- girls had completed their purchases, 
some of those who lived near went home to arrange 
their baskets, while others sat down on stones and 
stools outside the market, and proceeded to get 
ready for the day's work. I became intensely 
interested in watching them assort their flowers. 
In the majority of cases I noticed that from two 
market bunches they very deftly and quickly manu- 
factured three. Then sticks and strings were brought 
into requisition, and in less than half an hour all 
was in readiness. I approached one of these girls 
in a meek, bashful way, and asked her if she would 
show me how to arrange my basket. Her refusal 
to help me was particularly emphatic — so much so 
that I thought it discreet to leave her — for in the 
most pronounced Cockney she informed me that I 
had best move on and away, else she would give 
me a "jab in the eye." I held no further converse 
with her, feeling that, although under ordinary cir- 
cumstances I was capable of holding my own in a 
war of words, I was more than likely to come out 
only second best in a fist encounter. 

In a group just outside the market were three 
generations of flower-sellers. The oldest woman 
was about fifty years of age. Her daughter and 
granddaughter stood near sorting flowers, and after- 
wards each took her way to different parts of 
London. I have been told that the business of 
flower-selling is hereditary, and that nearly all of 



A Day with the Flower-Girls. 143 

the London flower-girls have, or had, mothers, 
grandmothers, and even great-grandmothers, engaged 
in the same line. The trade is handed down from 
mother to daughter, and the girls have often given 
to them a little hoard of money laid aside by their 
ancestors. 

After I had purchased two dozen bunches of 
violets at eightpence a dozen, two clusters of 
lilies at tenpence each, and a bundle of moss for a 
penny, I obtained the permission of a woman in the 
market to sit down on an up-turned basket in her 
stall and complete the arrangement of my outfit for 
the day. My ideas on this subject had been more 
theoretical than practical ; for, with all my preparations 
for making an artistic-looking basket, I had neglected 
to provide myself with a very important item — 
a shingle, with small holes, in which to place my 
flowers, to make them stand upright. The market- 
woman came to my assistance with a bit of paste- 
board, and with my pocket-knife I bored holes the 
proper size to hold the stems of my bunches. After 
the violets were fitted in, I divided the lilies into 
clusters of three sprays each and put them in odd 
corners. Then between the rows of violets I sprinkled 
the green moss. Once finished, my basket was cer- 
tainly a dainty-looking affair, and I felt no doubt 
that I should carry on a good trade. 

As I left Covent Garden, and hurried along the 
Strand, I think I must have had the air of a rather 
superior sort of flower-girl, for several persons eyed 
me rather curiously. When, at last, having reached 
Piccadilly Circus and taken my stand under a lamp- 
post, I opened my mouth to inform the passers-by 



144 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

that I had " Violets, sweet violets, at a penny a bunch," 
I started at the sound of my own voice. 

I had not been there many minutes before I heard 
someone say, " Oh, what a beautiful basket ! " 

Turning to the speaker, I picked out one of the 
bunches and repeated the price of my wares. The 
admirer of my basket was a young lady accompanied 
by a gentleman, who immediately purchased one 
bunch of lilies and two of violets. 

He looked at me kindly and said, " Selling many 
flowers to-day ? " 

" Not yet," I answered ; " I'm just out. This is 
my first day in business." 

The young lady smiled encouragingly, and said, 
" You'll surely sell a good many. You look so nice 
and neat, and your basket is so pretty ! " 

As the gentleman was handing me fivepence, his 
fair companion suggested that he give me an extra 
penny for luck, so from that deal I received sixpence. 

My artistic-looking basket attracted many cus- 
tomers who, I felt sure, would not otherwise have 
thought of buying flowers. 

" My, what a fine spread you have ! " observed a 
young man to whom I sold a boutonniere. 

In a little cushion at the side I carried some pins, 
so I fastened the violets on his coat-lapel, and he, 
too, smiled benignly upon me and gave me twopence 
instead of a penny. 

Noticing a grey-haired, benevolent-looking lady 
standing at a shop window, and thinking she might 
be a possible customer, I went towards her. 

" Violets, lady, violets ? " I asked, looking at her 
in a pitifully appealing way. 




"I FELT MEEK AND LOWLY." 
(From a Photograph by the London Stereoscopic Company.) 



K 



146 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

" No, no, child," she replied, almost savagely ; 
and., after that repulse, I made no further advances to 
benevolent-looking ladies. It did not take me long 
to discover that the men were my best customers, 
and that those accompanied by ladies were always 
the most generous. Were I a permanent flower-girl, 
I should devote my attention almost exclusively to 
such men. He would be a man of particularly stony 
heart who could refuse to buy a bouquet after the 
fair creature at his side had said — " Oh, what beauti- 
ful violets ! How artistically they are arranged ! " 

Two or three times I left my post and wandered 
along the middle of the sidewalk, where I did quite a 
flourishing business. 

" Get out of this ! Can't ye see ye block the 
way ? " said a policeman, taking me by the shoulders 
and pushing me towards the edge of the walk. 

It was wonderful what that change of costume had 
done for me ! With the clothes I had donned, and 
the basket I carried, I seemed to have put on a new 
character and a different temperament. That day I 
felt like a flower-girl — not, certainly, like my coarse- 
voiced associates who were gathered across the way 
about the fountain, but like a meek and lowly 
dealer in blossoms, with a strange sort of impression 
that, in some way, my daily bread depended on my 
selling those flowers. 

Had I been my natural self when that policeman 
spoke to me, Piccadilly Circus would have been 
enlivened by a combat between an officer of the law 
and an angry maiden ; but I was not myself — I was 
somebody else — and I received his rebuke mildly as a 
lamb, and returned to my position under the lamp-post. 



A Bay with the Flower-Girls. 147 

As matinee time came on, my flowers sold even 
more readily, and my basket was soon more than half 
empty. Just then I noticed one of the flower-girls 
from the fountain coming over towards me. When 
she reached my stand she shook her fist angrily 
/a.t me. 

" Yer hundersellin' us ! What d'yer mean by it ? " 
she demanded. 

"Why, what have I done to you?" I asked, 
wonderingly. 

" Yer sellin' violets for a penny a bunch the same 
as we's selling for tuppence. Wait till I catch ye! 
A laidy just said we wus cheatin' her." 

In the short time I had sold flowers I had become 
a marvel of meekness and gentleness, and I did not 
stop to argue the point out with her. " Violets, sweet 
violets, a penny a bunch ! " I sang out as a dashing 
young man passed me, and my discomfited opponent 
left me, muttering threats of dreadful vengeance to be 
visited upon me in future. 

" Violets, sir?" I said to a kind-looking, red- 
whiskered man. He shook his head, whereupon I 
gave him a sorrowful, melancholy look. The man 
turned back. " I think I'll have a couple of bunches," 
he said, fumbling in his pocket for change. My look 
of woe-begoneness had its effect. While I stood 
there, three men of clerical dress and mien passed me, 
but they did not purchase violets. 

"Yes, we must take a bunch to Auntie," I heard 
someone say, and then, "Why, she's got just enough 
for us." 

"How much?" asked a pretty little boy in a 
sailor suit, taking up a bunch of lilies. 



148 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

"Threepence," I answered. 

The important-looking man who held the little 
boy's hand gave me a sixpence for the lilies and two 
bunches of violets. 

"Keep the change," said he; "now you're sold 
out, and you'll have to fill your basket again." 

So many people spoke kindly to me that after- 
noon that I began to think that the world was not so 
hard, after all, even for a flower-girl. 

It was four o'clock, and my basket was empty. I 
tried to refill it by jetting flowers from some of my 
companions in trade, but they demanded such ex- 
orbitant prices for their wares that I decided to 
return to Covent Garden and buy another dozen 
bunches from the general dealers there. I could not 
procure them as cheaply as I had done in the morn- 
ing, and was obliged to pay the regular price, a penny 
a bunch. However, they were large, and I thought 
ought to retail for twopence a bunch. 

When I passed again through the Strand people 
were going home from the matinees, and I stopped in 
front of two of the theatres hoping to make some 
sales. It was a bad time. Those who wanted flowers 
had been supplied before going to the theatre, and I 
did not sell any. 

A poorly-clad little girl of eleven or twelve years 
old, carrying a few sprays of drooping hyacinths, 
stopped me with " How much for violets, missus? " 

" Twopence a bunch," I answered. 

" Make 'em cheaper," she pleaded ; " that's all I 
can sell 'em for." 

Then I realised that she was one of my kind, 
and when I knew this mite of humanity was in the 



A Day with the Flower-Girls. 149 

'profession/' I sold her three bunches for twopence, 
the price of one. What was my loss was her gain. 
If she sold them, she made fourpence on the 
bargain. 

I returned to Piccadilly Circus with nine bunches 
of violets. 

" I'll take a bunch," said a young woman, handing 
me a penny." 

"Twopence, please, lady," I answered sadly, but 
firmly. I was becoming a thorough business woman, 
and was determined to sell my goods at a profit or 
not sell them at all. The young woman walked away 
Without buying. It grew darker and colder, and I 
still had nine bunches of violets to dispose of. My 
bare hands were getting purple, and I was hungry, 
having had no luncheon. The Circus began to get 
deserted, so I decided to move my stand of operations 
westward. Walking leisurely towards Oxford Circus, 
I repeated, at stated intervals, my very subdued cry 
of " Violets ! violets ! twopence a bunch ! " but there 
seemed to be no magic in the words. No buyers 
came to my call. Half-way between the Circuses a 
swagger-looking man rushed past me, threw two 
pennies into my basket, refused to take the flowers 
I held out to him, and left me bewildered, wondering 
whether he was a sinner trying to ease his conscience 
by doing a good deed in a wicked world, a lunatic, or 
a philanthropist. I was sorry he did not take his 
due, for I was as anxious to dispose of my flowers 
as to take in money. I wanted to go home, but I 
had a certain pride which forbade my returning 
home with such a quantity of unsold goods on my 
hands. 



150 



Campaigns of Curiosity. 



At six o'clock I was still standing at a corner 
of Oxford Circus, when I suddenly remembered that 
a literary acquaintance of mine (a well-known author), 
who was a recent convert to the " newer journalism," 
had a dinner-party on that evening, and it occurred 
to me that my violets would make very appro- 
priate favours for his guests. My tired feet bore 
me in the direction of Regent's Park, where, after 
sundry explanations of myself and my business, 
I induced the great man to purchase my violets. He 
very generously gave me two shillings for the lot, 
an advance of fourpence on the price asked. Thus 
it was that the bread I cast upon the waters when I* 
sold the little flower-girl three bunches for twopence* 
brought me immediate results. 

Returning home, I settled up my day-book, and 
this is how the page stood : — 



Paid Out. 



2 Dozen violets at Sd. 

1 Dozen violets at is. 

2 Clusters lilies at iod. 
I Bundle moss 



s. d. 
I 4 
i o 



Took In. 



24 Sprays lilies at id. 

1 Dozen violets at 2d. 

2 Dozen violets at id. 
Had given me 



Profit _ 



2 O 

2 O 
2 O 

o 5 

tJ. 

2 4 



When my accounts were settled, I was not over- 



A Day with the Flower-Girls. 151 

whelmed with the amount of my profits. Two shillings 
and fourpence a day was not a large wage, to be 
sure ! However, I took into consideration the fact 
that it was my first day, that I was new to the 
business, and I felt that, if I continued to work at 
the trade, I might reasonably expect to sell more 
flowers and make greater profits. Perhaps by selling 
flowers in the evening, as well as during the day, I 
might be able to make three shillings a day after I 
got fairly started, but that was as high as my am- 
bition allowed me to soar. That would only be 
eighteen shillings a week. Yet I have been told 
that the majority of the London flower-girls usually 
take in more than twice, and sometimes three times, 
that amount of money during the week, and I am 
in a quandary as to how the thing is done. 

But there are certain tricks of the trade, such as 
the dividing of the market bunches, taking posses- 
sion of more flowers than they pay for, selling ten 
bunches for a dozen, and other similar schemes. 

Although I have not, perhaps, spent as much 
time in investigating into the condition of the 
flower-girls as some may think necessary before 
passing an opinion, I am bound to say that, from 
what I have seen and learned of them, I cannot look 
upon them as a particularly deserving class of indi- 
viduals. They are unprepossessing in appearance, loud 
and rude in their manners, and I am inclined to think 
that the morals of many of them would not bear a 
close scrutiny. Some charitable ladies who have 
attempted to work among them say that they are a 
difficult class to reach, and that sympathy and kind- 
ness are usually wasted upon them. Not having 



152 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

tried the work of reformation, I am not able to speak 
authoritatively on that point ; and I should not caie 
to go as a missionary amongst them. They impress 
me as being of a *too combative disposition to make 
pieasant companions. 



AMONG THE LAUNDRY-GIRLS. 



CHAPTER I. 

WHY AND HOW I BECAME ONE OF THEM. 
THE laundry question is like the domestic servant 
problem. It interests everyone in all classes of 
society. If it is true that " civilised man cannot live 
without cooks," it is equally true that he cannot do 
without a laundress. Indeed, a man's happiness is to 
a greater degree dependent upon his laundress than 
his cook. Nothing can so quickly transform a kind, 
thoughtful, and good-tempered man into a frightful 
specimen of total depravity as a badly-ironed shirt- 
front or a limply-starched collar. Even men of the 
most angelic dispositions and piously inclined have 
been known to lapse into profanity over just such 
trifles. On second thought, " trifles " is not the word 
I should have used, for I agree that, of all the deplor- 
able-looking objects in the world, a man not properly 
" done up " is the worst. A man's personal appear- 
ance depends quite as much upon his shirt-fronts and 
collars and cuffs as a woman's good looks depend 
upon the way she arranges her hair. 

Despite the fact that I live in the days of the 
" new womanhood," which demands stiff shirts, high 
collars, neckties, and waistcoats as proofs of complete 
" emancipation," I still hold to the belief that boiled 
shirts are, or should be, a man's exclusive property, 
and I can readily understand his objection to the 



154 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

" new woman " who, in her fierce clamour for what she 
calls her " rights," will not stop to consider the wrongs 
she is inflicting on the opposite sex, and, not content 
with having, in some professions, deprived man of 
his means of livelihood, would now take away from 
him his very clothes. 

There is one thing in connection with the sub- 
ject of laundry work that I have never been able 
to understand, and that is the rooted objection that 
most men have to paying their washerwomen. One 
would think that, dependent as they are upon these 
women for half their life's happiness, they would, if 
they could, pay them promptly and without protest. 
Why men always object to paying laundry bills is 
something beyond my comprehension. Bachelors in 
good standing, socially and financially, who are noted 
for discharging every other obligation, even to their 
tailors, will let the poor laundress wait for weeks, 
months, and sometimes years, and then allow her to 
sue them for her long-accumulated bill. They seem 
to do these things on general principles. It was but 
a few weeks ago that the papers reported the case of a 
nobleman who, out of pure contrariness, refused for 
three years to pay his laundry bill, although perfectly 
able to do so ; and it was only after he was brought 
into court and the judge had remonstrated with him, 
giving him the choice of either paying up or going to 
gaol, that he would even consider the matter seriously. 
Laundresses say that men of means give them more 
trouble than any other customers ; and proprietors of 
lodging-houses and hotels assert that well-to-do men, 
who can always be relied upon to pay for their board 
and apartments when due, will each week pin their 



Among the Laundry-Girls. 155 

laundry accounts upon the wall, until in time the 
pattern of the wall-paper is almost hidden from sight 
by these unreceipted bills. It is easy enough to 
understand why the man in the state of "broke" 
allows such things to happen ; but why gentlemen of 
means should be so prejudiced is a puzzle that I 
doubt if even they themselves would be able to 
solve. 

About once in a decade the public is agitated over 
some new or old phase of the laundry question. A 
few years ago the whole of the United States was 
nearly frightened out of existence over the subject. 
Somebody (I believe it w r as not a newspaper reporter) 
one day took his linen to a Chinese laundry, and saw 
a Chinaman in the other end of the room with a white 
scar on his face. "White spots are symbols of 
leprosy," thought he, and then he went to talk the 
matter over with a medical man, who immediately 
got out his books on the subject. In a week the 
papers had taken the matter up, and John Chinaman 
was in a fair way to lose all his customers. Every- 
body talked about the dangers of leprosy. People 
who lived in hotels, flats, or boarding-houses, where 
washing must be sent out, were thrown into violent 
hysterics when told by the doctors that many of the 
Chinese laundrymen were lepers, and that the disease 
could be communicated by means of clean linen, 
until finally America became the land of the great 
unwashed. The baskets of soiled linen got full to 
overflowing, because people were afraid to send them 
to the laundries, while the shops, especially men's 
furnishing houses, carried on a thriving trade. Ladies 
living in hotels, where conspicuous among the rules 



156 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

of the house was the legend, " No Washing Allowed 
in the Rooms," locked and barred their bedroom 
doors, and washed handkerchiefs and stockings in the 
wash-bowl or bath-tub, then hung them on the bed- 
posts and chair-backs to dry, and with the solitary iron 
they had surreptitiously purchased, smoothed the 
clothes out on the floor. 

At that particular time the politician took advan- 
tage of the panic to announce from legislative halls and 
lecture platforms that " the Chinese must go," and 
very few there were who ventured to contradict him. 
After a while the tumult subsided, and it was suc- 
ceeded by the " typhus scare " and the " cholera 
scare." 

We make a speciality of " scares " in the United 
States. Sometimes we are able to run two or three 
at once, but we are never without one. Our peculiar 
temperament and the variable climate demand this 
sort of excitement, and when one " scare " is past, and 
another takes its place, we are neither better nor 
worse off than we were before. 

I do not suppose that I should ever again have 
thought of the "laundry scare" had I not gone to 
reside in lodgings for a time, and so put on my 
own responsibility as regarded the choice of a laun- 
dress. Even then I did not trouble myself much 
about it, except to tell the housemaid to get me a 
laundress, and she provided me with the person 
who did the washing for the other lodgers. For a 
few weeks all went on well enough, until I one day 
picked up a medical paper and read an article about 
" Infection from Laundries," in which the writer told 
terrible tales of how inoffensive people, especially 



Among the Laundry-Girls. 157 

those living in lodgings, suddenly found themselves 
stricken down with smallpox, scarlet-fever, or diph- 
theria, all because their clothes were washed under 
unsanitary conditions. The writer warned his readers 
against sending their linen to laundries consisting 
of but one room, which served not only for wash- 
house and drying-grounds, but bedroom, sitting- 
room, kitchen, and goat-stable as well. When 1 
carne to the part which advised everybody to find 
out for himself and herself just how and where their 
clothes were washed, it dawned upon me that, in 
failing to make the acquaintance of my own laun- 
dress, I had been guilty of a crime against myself 
and society at large. What if I should get smallpox 
or scarlet-Lver, all because of my neglect of this 
matter ! 

I rang the bell for the housemaid. Again and 
again I turned the handle, until peal after peal re- 
sounded through the house. 

" Martha, who washes my clothes ? " I demanded, 
when at the end of half an hour's ringing, she made 
her appearance. 

" I think her name is Mrs. Johnstone, miss," 
answered Martha, looking at me in a strangely sus- 
picious way ; and then she added, " Did she lose 
anything last week ? " 

" Do you mean to say that you are not sure of 
the woman's name ? " I asked, paying no attention 
to her solicitude in regard to the number of " pieces " 
that had been returned. 

"I'm quite sure it's Johnstone," she answered 
again, this time with more decision. 

" What is her address ? " 



158 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

" I can't tell you at all, miss." 

" That's strange. I must know where she lives. 
I want to call on her." 

Then Martha suggested that the landlady would 
probably know, so she went down-stairs and re- 
turned with the information that Mrs. Johnstone lived 
" somewhere near 'Ammersmith," but nobody knew 
just where. 

It was Tuesday, and the clothes would not be 
returned until Saturday, and there seemed to be no 
way of obtaining the address before that time. I 
blamed the washerwoman for not having yet sent 
me a bill with her name and address at the top, and 
I despised the landlady and all her lodgers because 
of their stupidity. To discover the whereabouts of 
a Mrs. Johnstone who lived somewhere near Ham- 
mersmith looked like a feat far beyond my powers 
of accomplishment, but that medical paper had 
wrought my nerves up to such a state that I could 
neither eat nor write nor sleep until I had at least 
made an attempt to find her. 

I went to the post-office and consulted that part 
of the " Directory " given up to the J's, and the 
multitude of Mrs. Johnstones who lived somewhere 
near Hammersmith and took in washing threatened 
to deprive me of my reason. Visions of a horrible 
hovel, with babies and goats and chickens galore, 
and a sickly-looking woman washing my best hand- 
kerchiefs in poverty, hunger, and dirt, rose continually 
before me, and would not be dispelled. Yet I could 
spare neither the time nor the money that the finding 
of Mrs. Johnstone would involve. What little reason 
I had left told me that the only thing I could do 



Among the Laundry-Girls. 159 

was to wait till Saturday ; so I gave Martha in- 
structions to get the woman's full name and address 
when she returned the clothes. Then I tried to 
compose myself to write a paper on " The Duty of 
S^lf-Control," but my thoughts were all of wash-tubs 
and ironing-boards, and I decided that I ought to 
know more about the laundry business than I did. I 
began to think not only about small washerwomen, 
but steam-laundries and laundry-girls, who, according 
to common report, were the most wicked of their sex 
in. London. I had heard direful tales of the way they 
pulled each other's hair, scratched one another's eyes 
out, and insulted good people who tried to reform 
them. 

Having once got so far interested in the subject, 
it was but natural that I should follow it up in the 
only way that I could conceive of getting correct 
information, and that was by becoming a laundry- 
girl myself. 

In order to get a situation, I answered all the 
advertisements for " learners " that I could find in the 
morning papers, and then I inserted an advertisement 
on my own account : — 

A YOUNG WOMAN wants a situation in a large 
first-class Laundry, where she can learn the 
business. No wages. 

It was on that last clause that I most depended 
for my answers, for I knew there were many people 
who were waiting to secure something for nothing. I 
was particularly careful in the wording of my adver- 
tisement, so that it should not in any way resemble 
the one I had inserted when T sought a place in 
domestic service. I determined that, in this instance, 



160 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

I would not pose as an " educated and refined young 
woman." That sort of thing could not be tried 
again. The proprietor of a laundry would not know 
how to " place " such qualities. 

While I waited for applicants for my services, 
which I had no doubt would be numerous, I busied 
myself in preparing for a week in a laundry. I got 
together a suit of clothes neither conspicuously un- 
becoming nor altogether too nice — a sort of medium 
between the coster and shop-girl style — in which I 
might apply for a place ; and I bought a black-and- 
white polka-dot blouse and apron for work in the 
laundry. The subject of references would not, I 
thought, be so troublesome as it had been when I was 
seeking a place as housemaid, but I arranged to have 
a reference given if it should be required. I feared 
that my greatest difficulty would be my American 
accent, which for the past three months I had tried to 
lose (for professional purposes only). But it was 
still quite as pronounced as on the day I arrived in 
London, and was continually getting me into trouble 
when I endeavoured to pass for somebody else. Yet 
now I trusted to Providence that I would not be 
called upon to account for it when I applied for a 
situation in a laundry, because, once asked if I were 
an American, it was always necessary for me to 
depart from strict veracity in order to explain how I 
happened to be in London. 

Much to my disappointment, I received no an- 
swers on the next day nor the day following, and 
my faith in advertising as a means of obtaining any- 
thing and everything began to waver. At the end of 
the week one lone letter was handed to me. It was 



Among the Laundry-Girls. 161 

from the Y and Z Sanitary Laundry in an 

East London suburb, and in it I was informed that in 
this laundry there was just such a place as I had 
advertised for, and I was asked to call on Satur- 
day morning-. I had also another appointment at 
ten o'clock on Saturday with the only person who 
had answered one of the many letters I had written 
applying for a place. This was in the neighbourhood 
of Streatham, and I went there first. 

Mrs. S , the " proprietress " of the place, opened 

the door. From a height of six feet and a breadth of 
little less, she looked at me in amazement when I 
told her I was " Lizzie Barnes," who had written to 
her for a place as "learner." It was the same old 
story, " too little ! " I assured her that, though small, 
my strength was little short of that possessed by 
Samson, and I reiterated the statement I had made 
in my letter to her that I could " iron good." 

The result was that in half an hour Mrs. S 

concluded to give me a trial, not only at the ironing- 
board, but in what she called the " washus." She 
made no remarks about my American accent, neither 
did she ask for references, and I concluded it would 
be well for me to accept the situation, not knowing 
whether it would be possible to secure another one. 

While talking with Mrs. S , it occurred to me 

that the proprietors of the Y and Z Laundry 

might not be so favourably impressed with my abilities 
as a laundress, so I told her I would like to try the 
place. She explained that her laundry (" landry " she 
called it) was only a small one, where but six girls were 
employed, and that all the work was done by hand. 
The " washus " was in the basement of the house, but 
L 



1 62 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

the rest of the work was done in a red-brick building, 
which I could see in the rear of the house. From the 
windows I noticed several girls ironing, while in the 
yard a frowzy-haired young woman was taking down 
clothes from the line. 

41 Will you take me through the laundry ? " I 
asked, curious to get a look at the girls with whom I 
expected to associate for the next week or longer. 

" Oh, no, Saturday is such a busy day, I can't do 
that," she answered ; and, plead as I would, I could 
not induce her to gratify my curiosity. But she was 
very sociable, offered me a glass of ale, and, when 
I refused it, said she thought I would have to take 
beer if I went into the laundry business. Then the 
question of " living in " came up. She was not par- 
ticularly anxious that I should "live in," for, of 
course, that would necessitate her giving me my 
board ; but to " live in " was a part of my plan, 
because all the girls lived there together, and Mrs. 

S , remembering that, after all, I was not to 

receive any wages, and that a person of my size was 
not likely to have an enormous appetite, agreed to 
" put me up " with the other girls. 

I had engaged to go on the next Tuesday, and 
was leaving the door, when I thought to ask if I 

should have a bed to myself. Mrs. S was quite 

surprised at the question, and explained that, as there 
was but one room with three beds, and as I would 
make the sixth girl, a bed to myself would be an 
impossibility. I decided that I would prefer to " live 
out " and board myself, and when I bade her good 
morning, it was arranged that I was to go to work 
the next Tuesday morning. 



Among the Laundry-Girls. 163 

When I called at the Y and Z Sanitary 

Laundry, I regretted my haste in engaging myself to 

Mrs. S . This laundry was worked by steam ; 

there were about thirty girls employed, and I felt sure 
that the experience I would gain there would be of 
greater advantage to me. But Mrs. Morris, the wife 
of the proprietor of the laundry, was by no means at 
first inclined to take me, because I seemed to know 
nothing about the business. However, I assured her, 

as I had done Mrs. S , that I could " iron good," 

which was to a certain extent true. 

" You mean you know how to do plain ironing ? " 
she asked. 

" Yes. When I lived home, I did all the family 
washing and ironing," I answered ; and even now 
I wonder how I ever dared to say it. 

Mrs. Morris looked at me rather sharply when 
I told her of my abilities in the way of washing and 
ironing. 

" Where was that ? " she asked. 

Then a nursery rhyme of my childhood days ran 
quickly through my mind — 

' ' Oh, what a tangled web we weave 
When first we practise to deceive," 

but, nevertheless, I answered, " In Australia." 

" I knew you couldn't be a Londoner. I thought 
you talked something like an American, but I sup- 
pose the accent is about the same ? " said Mrs. 
Morris. 

" Yes ; I'm an Australian. I lived there with my 
brother, but I came to London, and want to learn the 
laundry business." 
L 2 



164 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

Why I declared myself an Australian I hardly 
knew. I only thought I must say I was from some 
place far away, as Mrs. Morris might ask me for more 
particular references than I was prepared to give. 
It was fortunate for me that she knew nothing 
more about Australia than I knew, so that no em- 
barrassment followed, except that, as I looked across 
the room, one of the ironing-tables seemed suddenly 
covered with stars and stripes that somehow worked 
themselves into letters that spelt " TRAITOR ! " 

Try as I would, I did not succeed in inspiring 
Mrs. Morris with any sense of my capabilities, but 
she took me to her husband to ask him what he 
thought about it. He was also doubtful as to whether 
I was strong enough, but I begged so hard to be 
allowed to show what I could do, that he said, " Sup- 
pose we try her, as she don't want any wages," and I 
was engaged. 

I was told to come in next Tuesday, at the same 

hour at which I had agreed to go to Mrs. S * 

With two situations on hand, the work to commence 
at the same hour of the same day, it was clear I must 

give up one of them ; so I wrote to Mrs. S that I 

had decided not to take the place, as it would be 
too expensive to " live out " and not agreeable to 
" live in." 

On Monday, having obtained Mrs. Johnstone's 
address, I inspected her laundry, and found it to be a 
very proper sort of establishment, with a good wash- 
house, clean ironing-room, and a little yard for drying 
clothes. But I did not send my clothes to her that 
week ; I thought I would prefer to have them go to 
the Y and Z Sanitary Laundry, where I 



Among the Laundry-Girls. 165 

might have the novel experience of giving them my 
personal attention, so I had them sent there, and on 
Tuesday I was ready to commence my career as a 
laundry-girl. 



CHAPTER II. 

AT WORK IN A "SANITARY LAUNDRY." 

An atmosphere thick with steam and the odour of 
boiling soap-suds greeted me Tuesday morning, when 

I arrived at the Y and Z Sanitary Laundry 

to take my situation as a " learner." Ironing-machine, 
wringer, and mangle were revolving at a rapid rate, 
propelled by the large engine. Water was sputter- 
ing from the boilers in which the clothes were being 
washed ; a dozen girls and women were ironing, 
others were starching, sprinkling, or folding clothes, 
and a solitary water-soaked individual presided in 
one corner over some wash-tubs, applying a scrub- 
bing-brush to clothes that could not be put into 
the machines. All the work was done in one im- 
mense room, floored over with cement, which was a 
succession of hills and hollows, more dangerous in 
aspect than any American pavement. One side of 
the room was taken up with an ironing-machine and 
ironing-tables, the other side with the engine, boilers, 
wringer, mangle, and wash-tubs. A corner, in the 
vicinity of the engine, was floored over with some 
boards, and fitted up with crude-looking tables and 
a half-dozen large boxes. It was called the " sorting- 
room," and it was there that I was conducted by Mrs. 



i66 



Campaigns of Curiosity. 



Morris when I had removed my coat and hat and 
donned my working costume. Between the door and 
the sorting corner there stretched a large body of 




"A DOZEN GIRLS AND WOMEN WERE IRONING." 



soapy water, several yards square, and in some places 
almost ankle-deep. 

" Pick your skirts up," said Mrs. Morris, as she 
prepared to lead me across. I was on the point of 



Among the Laundry-Girls. \6y 

asking for a boat and ferryman, when I saw her 
step into the water and walk bravely over ; so, 
acting on the principle that the employee was no 
better than the employer, I also walked across, and 
landed with wet feet. I supposed that, of course, 
there had been an accident, that one of the boilers 
had turned upside down ; but I was afterwards told 
that the pond was always there. It was let out from 
the washing-machines in which the linen was boiled, 
and allowed to flow about the place until it found its 
way to a small sewer underneath a board, where it 
sunk into the ground, and its place was taken by 
more water from the next boiler of clothes. Taking 
into consideration the fact that I was in a " sanitary " 
laundry, it was only natural that I should have been 
surprised that there were no pipes for the purpose of 
carrying off this water. 

In the sorting-corner I was introduced to Miss 
Stebbins, the head packer and sorter, a position con- 
sidered to be the most genteel in the business. 
It was there that I spent the first three days of my 
apprenticeship. 

Until I was set to making figures with red cotton 
I had never thought of connecting needlework and 
laundry work. I had supposed my career as a 
needlewoman was ended when, just before I left Mrs. 
Allison's, I darned up the contents of the mending- 
basket ; but darning was as nothing compared with 
the making of figures with red cotton. With con- 
stantly-pricked fingers and agitated temper, I tried 
my best to stitch into the linen the numbers that 
Miss Stebbins instructed me to make, and, after much 
perseverance, I succeeded in learning all the figures 



i68 



Campaigns of Curiosity. 



Janie was a 
everybody about 



except 5 an d 6. Those two I would never have 
learned to make had not Janie, one of the girls, come 
to my assistance. 

sort of general utility maid for 
the place. She was short and 
slightly lame, and one shoulder 
was somewhat lower than the 
other. Her face had a strangely- 
combined expression of childhood 
and womanhood upon it. She 
had large, wandering blue eyes 
that looked glad and sad by 
turns ; and her hair hung down 
her back, half-braided, half-loose, 
after the fashion of the young 
girls who live in the East-End. 
She was an illustration of per- 
petual motion. She rarely sat 
down, and seldom stood still. 
There was an indescribable some- 
thing about her that made her 
seem oddly at variance with her 
surroundings. She looked as if 
she should have painted pictures or made music for 
the world, instead of living in and breathing an 
atmosphere of soap-suds. 

It was towards the end of the second day, when 
I had been vainly endeavouring to embroider the 
figure 6 on the corner of a serviette, that Janie came 
over to the sorting corner and accosted me with — 
" Hi'll 'elp you, Miss Barnes." 
She took my thimble and needle, and her nimble 
fingers soon worked out not only one 6 but a dozen 




JANIE. 



Among the Laundry-Girls. 169 

of them on a piece of calico she picked up from the 
floor. She did not sit down, and her feet kept up a 
rat-tat-tat on the boards while she gave me my 
lesson. 

When five o'clock came, and the girls were allowed 
a half-hour for tea, Janie invited me over to the other 
side of the room to share the large pot of tea that she 
had made for herself and older sister, who was one of 
the ironers, and at the rate of five farthings a shirt 
was sometimes able to earn three-and-six a day — 
more money than any other woman in the laundry 
was capable of earning. She poured the tea from the 
rusted pot into a thick cup minus a handle, and 
ordered me to drink it quickly, so that she might 
also have her tea, for there were only two cups for the 
three persons. Never medicine was more difficult 
to swallow than Janie's tea. It tasted stale, and 
strong, and bitter, although quantities of queer- 
looking brown sugar had been put into it ; but I 
drank it down heroically. 

During this half-hour the ironing-boards were 
turned into tea-tables, and, as Mr. and Mrs. Morris 
had gone into the house, which adjoined the laundry, 
for their own tea, the workers had a few minutes for 
social intercourse. A dark-skinned, demure-looking 
girl sat on a box by the collar-machine, over which 
she presided during working hours, and read the 
Church Missionary Intelligencer and Church Mis- 
sionary Gleaner, while she sipped her tea. Janie 
whispered to me that it was Annie Martin, who was 
very religious, and wanted to become a missionary, 
but, on account of a defective education, was unable to 
pass the examination that was required. 



170 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

Janie's sister munched her bread-and-butter and 
read a penny novel at the same time ; while Mrs. 
Bruckerstone, one of the older women, entertained 
the assemblage by giving a practical illustration of 
the difference between " piece-work " and " day- 
work." She showed how, in doing piece-work, where 
the number of articles ironed governed the amount of 
pay, the worker moved about briskly and eagerly. 
Then, in illustration of day-work, she picked up an 
apron, shook it out, smoothed it on the board, patted 
it down, and took her time over ironing it. During 
that half-hour I became acquainted with all the 
women in the place, and was surprised to find that 
they were not at all like the description I had always 
heard of laundry-girls. I heard no profanity, no bad 
language, and no quarrelling. With the exception of 
a few older women, most of them were girls between 
the ages of fifteen and twenty-five. However, Janie 

told me that the girls employed in the Y and 

Z Laundry were superior to those engaged in the 

surrounding laundries. It seems they did scratch, and 
fight, and swear in a laundry only a mile distant ; but 
Mr. and Mrs. Morris made it a point to keep their 
place rather "select" as regarded the characters of 
their employees. 

When Janie and I returned to the marking, she 
regaled me with an account of all the accidents to 
which girls working in steam laundries were liable, 
and this in no way added to my peace of mind. It 
appeared that boilers sometimes blew up, although 

they had never done so in the Y and Z 

Laundry ; leather belts flew off the wheels and hit 
the bystander's eyes ; fingers were mashed, and 



Among the Laundry-Girls. 171 

sometimes clipped off, in working at the mangle 
and wringer. Only recently one of the girls had 
been taken away to the hospital, where she had been 
obliged to have three of her fingers amputated, 
because they had slipped into the rubber rollers of 
the wringer. But Janie declared this affair was all 
due to carelessness, as the girl was looking about and 
talking, instead of attending to her work. One of 
Janie's fingers, I noticed, was flattened, but it had not 
been done at the laundry. She had been chopping 
wood, and hit it with an axe. 

" Hi'm always in the wars, Miss Barnes," said she. 
"When Hi were a baiby, Hi were dropped on the 
paivement, and the bruise went hinside instead of 
hout. That's what maikes me laime." 

" How did you get the scar on your forehead ? " I 
asked. 

" Hi fell on the fender." 

Poor little Janie ! she really had been through 
the wars. If there was any trouble with the 
girls or the customers, she was always sent to 
make it right. If anything got lost, she must hunt 
until she found it, though having nothing to do with 
the losing of it. If delinquent customers refused to 
pay their bills, Janie was sent to make the collections, 
and usually returned with the money. A few days 
before I went to the laundry, Janie had, in packing 
the clean clothes, mixed the tablecloths of two 
customers, who, it happened, were near neighbours 
and deadly enemies. Janie, finding out her mistake, 
went to rectify it, and one of the neighbours, think- 
ing the exchange had been made purposely, took Janie 
and shook her until she was at last obliged to drop 



172 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

the tablecover she had brought and run back to 
the laundry for dear life. 

" Don't you get tired, running about so much from 
eight in the morning until eight at night ? " I asked 
her one day, when she had just come in from collect- 
ing long-overdue accounts. 

" No ; Hi'm never tired. Hi like to work all the 
time. Hi don't like Sundays, because Hi 'av' to be 
quiet." 

"Don't you like to read on Sunday?" I asked 
her. 

"Yes, sometimes. Hi always reads the People 
and the Quiver ; but Hi'd rather work." 

I was beginning to get intensely interested in this 
strange species of laundry-girl, who, as she one day 
told me, would be " haighteen years hold in Haugust," 
and was earning " haight " shillings a week. At first 
I was scarcely able to understand the Cockney 
dialect over which she was complete mistress; 
but by degrees I became accustomed to it, and 
I was really in danger of getting to talk Cockney 
myself. Several times I discovered her looking 
curiously at me, and one day she asked me if I had 
had much "schooling." I answered that I did not 
know as much as I wished I did ; and she began to 
consider how she might help me. 

" When Hi first saw you, Miss Barnes," said she, 

" Hi said to myself, ' She's a nice young ' " There 

Janie stopped, and was lost in meditation. I had 
half-expected she was going to speak of me as a 
"young lady ; " but no. She appeared to be thinking 
for a time as to what was the correct word, and then 
she ended with " person " I However, I had become 



Among the Laundry-Girls. 173 

used to being called a " young person " when I was 
in service, so I took no offence at Janie's disinclination 
to place me out of what might be my proper sphere. 

On Thursday I was wondering what could have 
become of the clothes I had sent to the laundry, when 
Janie unpinned a parcel, and informed me that it had 
been sent by a new customer, and all the pieces 
needed marking. They were my own personal pro- 
perty. 

" There ought to be some other way of marking 
clothes, especially the fine ones," I said, as I picked 
up my best new handkerchief and proceeded to 
number it. Janie insisted that red cotton could not 
hurt anything, but I was of a different opinion. It 
stood to reason that the coarse cotton must soon tear 
holes in fine linen, but Janie declared that everything 
must be marked, and she concluded that as it was 
for a new customer, and she wanted it done nicely, 
she had better do it herself. 

The system of identifying the different articles at 
the London laundries might certainly be improved. 
In America the Chinamen have a way of attaching 
labels by a single thread, which is cut after the 
clothes have been ironed. This is certainly a much 
better plan than the use of the disfiguring and ruinous 
red cotton, although even this trouble might be 
avoided if all clothes were stamped with the owner's 
full name before being sent to the laundry. 

I one day asked Janie why the place was called 
a "sanitary laundry." From what I had seen of the 

Y and Z Laundry, I could not discover that 

it was intended to have any very sanitary effects upon 
the girls that were employed there. Janie thought it 



174 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

was probably sanitary because it was worked by 
steam, and no chemicals were used. Other laundries 
used chloride of lime and carbolic acid to whiten the 

clothes, but the Y and Z people avoided 

everything but soda and soap. However, this ex- 
planation was hardly satisfactory to me, especially as 
every morning, and several times during the day, I 
was obliged to walk through the water from ihc 
boilers, and I was getting a sore throat in conse- 
quence. It seemed to me there should have been 
some outlet for the steam, which was sometimes 
nearly suffocating, and must surely affect the health 
of the girls, though when I complained of it they 
assured me 1 would get used to it in time, and would 
not notice it. The one room served not only for a 
laundry, but a 'small portion of it was used for 
stabling purposes for the two horses that hauled the 
delivery waggons. Amid the din of the machinery 
and the whizzing of the steam, the sound of their 
pawing and neighing could be heard. When they 
were taken to and from the waggon, they walked 
directly through the laundry door, and indeed their 
so-called stable was only partitioned off on one side, 
and they were in plain sight all the time. The poor 
animals must have suffered intensely from the steam 
and heat of the place. And all this in a " sanitary 
laundry " ! 

I will admit that I did not hear any of the girls 
complain of the inconveniences I have mentioned. 
They probably saw nothing incongruous in a laundry 
and stable combined in one ! But I am sure that, had 
the poor beasts been able to talk, they would have 
bad some objections to offer, 



Among the Laundry-Girls. 175 

When Thursday afternoon came, I began to grow 
tired of marking and sorting, and I begged Mrs. 
Morris to let me show my skill in ironing. It was 
difficult to convince her that I had any talents in 
that direction. She thought I had better keep to the 
sorting for several weeks before I attempted ironing. 
"You must not expect to learn everything in a week. 
It takes months to learn anything about the laundry 
trade," she said to me, after I had requested a change 
of occupation. I told my troubles to Janie, and she, 
too, laughed at the idea of my leaving off sorting when 
I had not worked three days. I think I must have 
looked particularly downhearted at this, for Janie 
suddenly changed her mind, and said — 

"Never mind, Miss Barnes ; Hi'll hask Mis' Morris 
about it in the morning." 



CHAPTER III. 

A CONTEST WITH FLAT-IRONS. 
ON Friday morning I was sent to the " preparing- 
table" to sprinkle and fold; some servants' print 
dresses. From a distance the work had looked easy 
enough, but Agnes, the head preparer, who, by the 
way, bore a striking resemblance to the pictures of 
the Grand Duchess of Hesse, taught me that there 
was a special method of distributing the water, and a 
particular twist and turn to give the sleeves and 
bodice, to say nothing of the compactness and firm- 
ness with which they must be folded up. I was im- 
pressed with the kind treatment I received from these 
girls, who looked upon me as a beginner from their 



176 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

own ranks. Not one but tried to help me over the 
hard places of my first week's experience, and, despite 
the awkwardness that I must have displayed in every- 
thing I attempted, they tried to encourage me, assur- 
ing me that I would get used to things in time. 

While Agnes was telling me how hard it had 
been at first for her to learn the art of shirt-starching, 
I noticed that an animated conversation was being 
carried On in another part of the room between Mrs. 
Morris and Janie. Then Mrs. Morris came over to 
me, and said she had decided to let me iron a little, 
and perhaps I would succeed better with it than I had 
done with marking. 

So an extra table was brought into the laundry 
and fitted up with ironing tools, and, as Mrs. Morris 
handed me a bag of handkerchiefs, she said — 

"Now, mind you don't pay attention to Mrs. 
Bruckerstone, that stout woman that's beside you. 
She's the biggest gossip in the place, and will ask you 
no end of questions about yourself, and tell you all 
she knows about the other girls." 

Then I was seized with an inclination to cultivate 
Mrs. Bruckerstone's acquaintance. 

Mrs. Morris led me to the stove, took up an iron 
and held it with one hand close to her face. 

"That's the way to tell if it's hot enough," she 
explained. 

" But suppose the iron should slip and hit me in 
the face ? " I asked, horrified already at the dangers 
that loomed in my path. 

" You must take your chances about that. How 
else would you know the iron was right?" she 
answered. 



Among the Laundry-Girls. lyy 

" Why, try it with my fingers, like this. I always 
did it so at home ; " and then I illustrated the way I 
had managed with the family ironing in Australia. 

" Well, that's not right ; but you can do it that 
way, if you like," was her reply, as she went back to 
her own table, where she was always surrounded with 
books and bills. 

I thought then that Mrs. Morris had concluded 
that a girl so afraid of burning her face would hardly 
do for laundry work, and I had not a doubt but she 
would tell me so later on ; but I went to the table 
assigned me, and commenced on the handkerchiefs 
without any regrets. When I had finished my first 
piece, I thought it time to open conversation with 
Mrs. Bruckerstone, who stood near me, ironing 
children's frocks. 

" I think you iron beautifully," I remarked, as she 
returned from the clothes-horse, where she had hung 
an embroidered baby-dress, which really did her 
great credit. I could see that I had put myself 
in Mrs. Bruckerstone's good graces at once, as she 
replied — 

" When ye've been at it long as me, Hi 'ope 
ye'll hiron as well. Hi've been in the business twenty 
years." 

I observed that, if I ever learned to iron half as 
well as she did, I'd be content, and then we were 
friends. 

I had supposed I knew how to iron handkerchiefs, 
but Mrs. Bruckerstone said I needed some instruc- 
tions, and, though I did very well for a beginner, my 
method was not quite correct. They must be ironed 
from hem to hem, and folded together with the red 
M 



178 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

cotton mark on the outside, so that the packer would 
know to whom they belonged. 

" Where ye from ? " she asked. 

" Near Oxford Circus." 

" That's a long waiys off. Must cost ye a pretty 
penny for trine fare. Ye ought to find lodgings 
hereabouts." 

" Yes, I'm thinking of doing that if I get on all 
right. I'm only here on trial now." 

" Going to be a shirt-hironer or finery-hironer?" 

" I want to learn the whole business." 

"Then, Hi suppose, yer idee is to be a mana- 
gress," said Mrs. Bruckerstone, with the accent on the 
last syllable. 

At that time Mrs. Morris was not in hearing, and 
all the girls began to tell how they expected to spend 
the coming Bank Holiday, which was Whit Monday. 
When several had declared their intentions of going 
to fairs and " theayters," Mrs. Bruckerstone turned to 
me, and asked how I should celebrate the day. I 
replied that I thought I should go to Hyde Park. 

" Got a young man ? " was her next question. 

" Oh, yes," I answered. 

" What do he do for a living ? " 

I was about to say I did not know, when I thought 
it would hardly do to have a young man and confess 
to ignorance of his occupation, so I said — 

" He's a soldier." 

"That's nice," said Mrs. Bruckerstone, approv- 
ingly. " Agnes's young man's a soldier, too. What's 
the naime of yours ? " 

I was getting into deep waters, and I began to floun- 
der, but I wanted to hold on a little longer, so I said- — 



Among the Laundry-Girls. 179 

" His name is Jones." 

I thought that would be a perfectly harmless name, 
but it transpired it was the very one I should have 
avoided, for my co-worker said — 

" Why's that's the naime of Agnes's young man. 
Hi wonder ft* they could be the saime ! What's his 
first naime ? " 

The waters were getting deeper and deeper. I 
dared not invent a first name, lest I should chance to 
hit upon the one that belonged to Agnes's young 
man. I pictured to myself how, in such an event, 
that young woman might be transformed from my 
interested friend into a bitter foe. Then the thought 
of Australia again saved me. 

" They couldn't be the same," I said to Mrs. 
Bruckerstone ; " my Mr. Jones is a soldier in Aus- 
tralia, and I haven't seen him for a year. I didn't say 
I was going to the park with him." 

That set matters right, and I was thankful to have 
escaped so easily. 

"Ye won't make much money at the rate yer 
hironing," remarked my companion, when, after 
having stood at the table three hours, I counted 
my handkerchiefs, and found I had ironed just thirty- 
four. 1 was so tired, I could hardly stand. I had 
several times burned my fingers, and once nearly 
fallen against the stove. Handkerchiefs were paid 
for at the rate of a penny a dozen, so, had I been 
a paid worker, I would have earned less than a penny 
an hour. 

The bag of handkerchiefs was empty, and I felt 
I must rest from my labours. It wanted fifteen i 
minutes till dinner-time, and I wondered how I 
M 2 




"LIZZIE BARNES," LAUNDRY-GIRL. 

{From a photograph by the London Stereoscopic Company,) 



Among the Laundry-Girls. 181 

should ever walk to the queer little restaurant where 
I bought my midday meal. 

" Suppose ye hiron this pinafore for me," said 
Mrs. Bruckerstone, taking from a hamper a much- 
embroidered garment, and laying it on my table. 
" Hiron the needlework on the wrong side, and don't 
crease it in the middle." 

" I'll do it after dinner. I'm so tired, I must rest," 
I protested ; but, looking up, I saw Mrs. Morris's 
eyes upon me, and, in order to avoid further conversa- 
tion with the woman, I concluded I had better do the 
pinafore. 

When at the end of twenty minutes I passed it to 
my teacher for inspection, she seemed surprised that 
I had done it so well, and announced her conviction 
that I would make a " finery-hironer," though I was 
rather slow. 

" Ye can 'elp me again this afternoon," she said, 
as she pinned on her bonnet preparatory to going 
home for dinner. 

All that afternoon I regretted having shown so 
much skill in the way of pinafore-ironing, for Mrs. 
Morris told me I might go on and help Mrs. Brucker- 
stone, only not to talk with her. 

After the dinner-hour, another pinafore was 
handed to me. My burnt fingers were smarting, 
and my feet were aching from walking to and from 
the stove. It took me an hour to finish that piece of 
work, and Mrs. Bruckerstone said it was not done so 
well as the first. Still, she was not discouraged. 
Two more pinafores were given me, and had it not 
been for the fact that I knew she was paid by the 
day, and not by the piece, I would have suspected 



1&2 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

she was trying to make money out of me. Finery- 
ironing was paid for at the rate of three shillings a 
day. It was done as day work for the reason that 
some articles were more elaborate than others, and so 
no average time for doing them up could be calcu- 
lated upon. In such cases, to pay a stipulated sum 
for each piece would have been unfair to both 
employer and employee. Shirt-ironers, I had been 
told, often added to their own earnings by the work 
turned out by learners, who, desirous of becoming 
proficient in the art of polishing, often " gave time " 
to the extent of several weeks, and sometimes two or 
three months. What presentable work they did was 
counted with that of their instructor, who in this way 
often made a shilling a day extra money. For this 
reason " piece-workers " were always ready to take 
pupils. 

But I knew Mrs. Bruckerstone could have no 
such deeply-laid scheme in regard to myself, and I 
had no doubt that she gave me pinafores to iron 
because of a genuine desire to help me, although I 
did not fully appreciate her interest in me. When, 
at four o'clock, I was still struggling over the third 
piece, having in the meantime several times sat down 
on an upturned hamper in order to rest, she began to 
lose her patience, which heretofore had indeed been 
Joblike both in quantity and quality. 

" Hi see yer not strong enough for a finery- 
hironer," said she, as for the fifth or sixth time I 
returned to my position on the hamper. " Hare ye 
good at Aggers ? " 

I confessed to ignorance of mathematics, and poor 
Mrs. Bruckerstone looked disheartened, as she replied ; 



Among the Laundry-Girls. 183 

" Hi were going to saiy ye might better work at 
books in a shop or factory." 

Then pointing to some nurses' sleeves which one 
of the women was ironing, she continued — 

" That's the kind of place ye want. Be a 'ospital 
nurse. Ye looks fit for that, kinder quiet and 
genteel." 

" Hospital patients are too cross and fidgety. I 
wouldn't like to be a nurse." 

Then she grew angry, and declared it was not 
what I liked, but what I must do. I was a failure at 
laundry work, and, if I hadn't " schooling " enough to 
figure, nothing was left for me but the hospital. 

At that I stopped resting, and changed my iron 
preparatory to going on with the pinafore. At tea- 
time it was finished, and Mrs. Bruckerstone exhibited 
her lively interest in my welfare by informing the 
girls that I had been two hours ironing an apron, work- 
ing five minutes and resting ten throughout the per- 
formance; in the face of which she asked their opinion 
as to whether or not I was likely to succeed in the 
profession I had chosen. They all agreed that 
laundry work was not my forte, and they put their 
heads together to think of some other calling which 
lay more in the line of my peculiar abilities for 
resting. 

One girl suggested that I go into a coffee-house, 
when Janie's sister interposed that such a situation 
would be too rough. Someone else asked me how I 
would like to be a barmaid ; but, when Mrs. Brucker- 
stone gave the information that barmaids had often 
to keep books as well as pour out drinks, that idea 
was given up. Dressmaking was spoken of, but 



1 84 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

Miss Stebbins, who had seen some of my early efforts 
at marking, and did not know of my lately-attained 
skill through Janie's instructions, expressed it as her 
opinion that I was not likely to succeed in any 
department of needlework. Attendance in a baker's 
shop next came up for discussion, and then Janie, 
who all this time had been keeping up a quiet 
thinking, announced that she thought a place in a 
nice confectioner's in the West-End would be just 
the thing for me. All the girls coincided with her in 
this, and so they settled it among themselves that I 
was to dispense cream chocolates and peppermint 
drops from behind a counter. 

So great had been the anxiety exhibited in regard 
to my future, and so earnest did the girls seem in 
advising me how to gain a livelihood, that, before tea- 
time was over, even I had become terrified at the 
outlook, and had worked myself up into the " alone- 
in-London " state of feeling. For the moment I had 
a vague apprehension of impending misfortunes, but 
Mr. Morris's shrill call of " Half-past five ! " which 
sent every girl to her w T ork, brought me back to my 
senses, and, telling the girls that I thought I would 
try the confectioner's shop, I accompanied Mrs. 
Bruckerstone to the ironing-table, and proceeded to 
iron the fourth and last garment. Then Mrs. Morris 
sent Janie with some towels and stockings, with the 
message that, when I had ironed them, I might come 
to her, as she had other work that she wished me 
to do. 

Towels and stockings completed, I was again 
almost overcome with " that tired feeling," and I went 
to Mrs. Morris with the hope that there might be no 



Among the Laundry-Girls. 185 

incompatibility between a chair and the work she 
had picked out for me. 

She and Janie were examining a large counterpane 
which had been torn in the wash by too energetic 
boiling. " Suppose we red cotton hit, Mis' Morris ? " 
said Janie ; " that will maike them think hit was done 
before hit caime here." By that time I had learned 
that to "red cotton" anything meant to put a few 
large stitches in an article that had been torn before 
its arrival at the laundry, and I thought Janie's idea 
of disposing of the torn counterpane a very brilliant 
one. 

" Here, Miss Barnes, you can sit down and darn 
up all these holes," said Mrs. Morris, handing the 
counterpane to me. Wishing I were back at the 
ironing-board, I took the quilt and sat down to 
needlework and despair. At first, like the bad work- 
woman that I was, I complained of my tools. The 
cotton was too coarse for the needle, and the thimble 
loaned me was far too large. I declared I could not 
sew under such conditions, and when Janie, out of 
the kindness of her heart, removed them, by lending 
me a large needle and a small thimble, my troubles 
were only increased. When done, the last state of 
the counterpane was no improvement on the first ; 
and when I handed it to Janie she looked first at my 
handiwork, then at me, and, with a pitifully resigned 
expression on her face, said — 

"You'll 'ave to taike it hout, Miss Barnes, and 
Hi'll do it when Mis' Morris goes into the 'ouse." 

It was then that my affection for Janie reached 
its highest point, and I determined that her kindness 
to me should not go unrewarded. 



1 86 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

" How long did you go to school, Janie ? " I asked. 

" Hi went through the seventh standard, Miss 
Barnes ; then Hi 'ad to work. How far did you go in 
books ? " 

"Oh, a little farther than that," I answered 
evasively. 

" Hit's too bad you can't teach in a Board School, 
Miss Barnes. Do you think you'll get a plaice at a 
confectioner's ? You might do that work, but som'ow 
I can't 'elp worrying. Hit seems so 'ard for you to 
learn things ! " 

Janie went on with her packing with a far-away 
look in her eyes, as though she were trying to think 
up some way by which I might be made capable of 
earning a livelihood. I also fell into a reverie con- 
cerning Janie. Unlike myself, it did not seem hard 
for her to " learn things," and I pictured her nervous 
little fingers flying over the keys of the typewriter, 
while I dictated to her the results of my future 
journalistic investigations. 



CHAPTER IV. 

THE DAY OF MY RESIGNATION. 

SATURDAY morning was the busiest time of all the 
week. The ironing was to be finished, and the 
clothes folded, packed in hampers, and delivered. It 
was a day of little rest for the horses, but they 
probably enjoyed the pulling and hauling in the 
fresh air much better than breathing the steam-laden 
atmosphere of their so-called " stable." 

The skill displayed by Miss Stebbins and Janie in 



Among the Laundry-Girls, 187 

.elling at a moment's inquiry just which numbers 
were meant for each of the customers was a source of 

wonder to me. The Y and Z Laundry had 

a good " trade," not only in the various parts of 
London, but in several of the surrounding suburbs. 
Between four and five hundred regular customers 
were enrolled on the books, so that the numbers 
which marked the clothes ranged all the way from 
one upwards. To be able to know five hundred 
people by number as well as by name seemed as 
marvellous a matter to me as the much-discussed 
dexterity of the head waiters in Chicago hotels, who 
can hand out the hat that belongs to each of two or 
three hundred men, and never make a mistake, though 
the hats are all alike. 

When one of the loads was nearly ready for de- 
livery, I heard rather an interesting discussion between 
Mrs. Morris and John, the driver. I learned that the 
securing of credit with his laundryman depended 
much upon the neighbourhood in which a man lived, 
the number of servants he kept, and, above all, the 
quantity and the quality of the shirts he sent to the 
wash. The customer who soiled fourteen shirts in a 
week was trusted implicitly, while he who sent only 
seven or less, with the brand of a less fashionable 
furnishing house upon them, was not given so long a 
time. Then there was the customer who wore coloured 
shirts during the week and white ones on Sundays 
and Bank Holidays, who must needs pay for his goods 
on delivery. Some of the accounts were allowed to 
run from three months to a year, others were required 
to be settled monthly, and with still others the rule 
was " pay down." 



1 88 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

" Shall I leave this 'amper, ma'am, if they doesn't 
pay ? " asked John of Mrs. Morris, as he shouldered a 
large basket and started for the waggon. 

" Well, it's a new customer," said Mrs. Morris ; 
" but they live in a good street, and all the clothes 
are of the finest quality. Yes, just leave them, and 
ask if they want a laundry-book." 

" But they rents their 'ouse furnished, ma'am ; the 
'ousemaid told me so," persisted John. 

" Oh, that's different ! Better collect the money, 
then. There's no knowing how long they'll stop 
there ! " answered Mrs. Morris. 

It seemed that the people who rented furnished 

houses were allowed no quarter at the Y and 

Z Laundry. 

I also discovered that the keepers of laundries 
knew quite as much about the private affairs of their 
customers as do the butcher and baker and other 
tradespeople. John had many a tale to tell of certain 
strange things that housemaid, cook, and butler 
related to him concerning the home-life of master 
and mistress. The kitchen-door confidences that 
passed between him and the servants, when he made 
his weekly "rounds," sometimes made entertaining 
gossip for the laundry-girls. When I heard some of 
this interesting talk, it occurred to me that it might 
be as well if all areas were fitted up with some sort 
of patent lifts, by which transactions with tradesmen 
could be carried on at a distance. It would certainly 
save much time, and family affairs might then be 
kept more closely at home. 

But, so far as Mrs. Morris was concerned, the only 
personal interest she took in her customers was in 



Among the Laundry-Girls. 189 

regard to the question of their ability to pay their 
accounts. She was one of the most clever and inde- 
fatigable business women I had ever seen. No one 
in the laundry worked as hard or as many hours in 
the day as herself. She inspected every department, 
and there was not a branch of the business with 
which she was not familiar. She had piercing black 
eyes, that showed her capabilities in the way of 
bargain-getting, and her nose was of the kind that 
physiognomists say denotes acquisitiveness. She was 
short and wiry, and, though under thirty years of age, 
she was more round-shouldered than many women of 
sixty. However, in this respect she resembled her 
employees, for there was not a straight- backed girl 
among them, and in some instances their shoulders 
were so bent that it amounted almost to a deformity. 
A few of the women were positively humped, and 
they made an uncanny sight as they stood over the 
ironing-boards. I spoke of it one day to Janie, and 
she replied, " Yes, Miss Barnes, all laundry-girls gets 
that waiy ; " and I have since observed that stooping 
shoulders are a peculiarity among them. 

Mr. Morris, with the assistance of a small boy, 
attended to the management of the engine and the 
machinery, while his wife overlooked everything else. 
She was even able to take his place if he was absent 
for a day. Both, though of somewhat better educa- 
tion than those who served them, had evidently 
sprung from the ranks of the lower classes, and their 
ambition to get on in the world was boundless. 
Believing in the proverb, " If you want anything done, 
do it yourself," they worked early and late, scarcely 
taking time to eat. Every morning, at seven o'clock, 



190 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

Mrs. Morris was in the laundry to see that all was in 
readiness for the girls to commence at eight. She 
breakfasted at half-past seven, and fifteen minutes 
later she was again at her post, where she re- 
mained until dinner-time. She ate dinner in twenty 
minutes, and was back before any of the girls had 
returned. At night, when the laundry was closed, 
she took her books to the house, and it was some- 
times as late as one or two o'clock in the morning 
when she had them settled. On one occasion, during 
the week I was there, she told me she had run thirty 
pairs of curtains through the ironing-machine after 
ten o'clock at night. She was not in any way 
unkind or unjust with the women she employed, 
rather putting herself on an equality with them, and 
demanding no work from them that she was not able 
and willing to perform herself. If any heavy lift- 
ing was to be done, she was always foremost in the 
fray. 

On Saturday, I noticed that she examined every 
piece of clothes before it was returned to the cus- 
tomers, and, if any article was badly gotten up, it was 
washed and ironed over again, even though she was 
obliged to do it herself. She was scrupulously con- 
scientious as to the manner in which the most 
unimportant part of the work was performed, and 
she would not, under any consideration, allow in- 
jurious chemicals to be used in the washing, no 
matter how much they might lighten the labour or 
lessen time. She carefully measured the amount of 
soda that was put into the washers, and the soap 
used was of the best quality. Any articles from 
which the colour had been taken out in the washing 



Among the Laundry-Girls. 191 

or boiling were laid aside for her special attention, 
and she restored lost blues, pinks, and other colours 
by dipping them into a solution of acetic acid. If, 
through careless handling in the laundry, spots of 
iron-rust got on the linen, she immediately applied 
salts of lemon to remove them. When goods already 
iron- rusted were brought to her, she charged a penny 
for each treatment. 

However, there was one thing she allowed that 
rather surprised me : that was the stringing of several 
collars and cuffs together before putting them in the 
washer. It was a good plan for keeping each person's 
collars separated from the others, but it had a ten- 
dency to tear out the button-holes. 

The girls at the Y and Z Laundry, 

unlike those employed in most places, were allowed 
to have their own work done at a slightly cheaper 
rate than that of the ordinary customers. Saturday 
afternoon I watched Janie hand to the women the 
small parcels containing their own personal property, 
and I wondered how girls earning from three to 
twenty shillings a week could be willing to pay out 
four or five pence for the doing up of a white skirt or 
ruffled blouse. Some of their bills amounted to over 
a shilling. 

Mrs. Bruckerstone had taken to the laundry, 
early in the week, a baby's bonnet, which was sup- 
posed to belong to someone in her family, so that the 
usual reduction was made in the price of it. Over 
the ironing of that bonnet there had been a near 
approach to a fight. The bonnet, with several others, 
was given to one of the women to iron, and when it 
was finished and hung on the horse the appearance 



192 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

did not please Mrs. Bruckerstone, so she got out her 
own bonnet-board and re-ironed it, saying it belonged 
to a neighbour of hers, and therefore must be done 
up extra well. The woman who had at first ironed 
it took the insult so much to heart that she turned 
informer, and reported to Mrs. Morris that Mrs. 
Bruckerstone had given out that she was the only 
proper "bunnit-hironer" in the place, and that, more- 
over, Mrs. Bruckerstone had been attempting to get 
reduced rates for her neighbours by passing off their 
goods as her own. 

Then Mrs. Morris announced that all neighbours 
must be charged full price, and Mrs. Bruckerstone's 
face wore a crestfallen look, when, as she was paying : 
her bill, an additional penny was charged for the 
unlucky bonnet. 

At a little after two o'clock there was a lull in the 
motions of the machinery, which showed that no 
more washing would be done that week. Each ironer 
continued to work until her particular lot of things 
was finished, and at about half-past three, all the girls 
were paid off for the week. The lowest wages were 
those earned by the smaller girls of about fifteen 
or sixteen years of age, who attended to the smooth- 
ing of towels and table-linen by putting them in and 
pulling them out of the large ironing-machine. Their 
portion was from three to six shillings a week. 
Agnes, the preparer, received eleven shillings ; Annie 
Martin, who stood at the collar-machine, was paid 
fourteen shillings ; Mrs. Bruckerstone had three 
shillings a day for the time she had worked, which 
amounted to about five days ; Janie's sister and her 
companions in shirt-ironing drew from fifteen to 



Among the Laundry-Girls. 193 

twenty-three shillings, according to their talents ; the 
girl who presided over the washtub received twelve 
shillings, and Miss Stebbins had fifteen shillings. 
Miss Stebbins was the only girl among them who 
did not live " home." She resided in apartments near 
the laundry, and for board and lodging paid out ten 
of the fifteen shillings. Saturday nights she went to 
the country to stop until Monday, the train fare cost- 
ing her another shilling, so she had four shillings left 
over for clothes and extras. When paid off, all the 
women, except Janie and Miss Stebbins, left the 
laundry to remain away until the following Tuesday, 
and as they went out of the door they were talking 
of various plans for Bank Holiday. 

The regular hours were from eight until eight, 
with twenty minutes for eleven-o'clock luncheon, an 
hour for dinner, and half an hour for tea. I had 
several times heard the girls discussing the proposed 
amendment to % the Factory Act ; but among them the 
idea seemed to prevail that the new law was to be an 
eight-hour law, which would reduce their hours of 
labour from eight in the morning until six at night. 
Those women who received their wages by the day 
or the week were in favour of having the hours 
reduced, while those who did piecework preferred to 
put in their time as they wished. This feeling was, 
of course, quite natural, for the ironers did not usually 
commence work until late Monday afternoon, and 
finished the week at a little after two on Saturday, 
thus making only five full days in the week. How- 
ever, the regular hours at the Y and Z 

Laundry were about what the Factory Act demands, 
so that Mrs. Morris knew she had no cause to trouble 
N 



194 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

herself about that phase of the matter. Quite often 
many of the girls were obliged to work overtime 
until nine or ten at night, but I was told that in such 
cases the overtime was not paid for — most of the 
employees receiving a weekly wage, and it was ex- 
pected that they would remain in the place until the 
work required of them was finished. So far as I 
could discover, few of them had any complaints to 
make in regard to the hours. Some of them had been 
employed in laundries where the hours were much 
longer, Annie Martin having recently left a situation 
where the regular hours were from eight in the morn- 
ing until eleven at night. 

Janie and Miss Stebbins were the two most often 
called upon to stop late, and were always the last to 
leave. While the other girls had a part, if not all, of 
the Saturday half-holiday, they were expected to 
stop with Mrs. Morris until the last parcel of goods 
was placed in the delivery waggon. On the Satur- 
day preceding Bank Holiday it was after seven 
o'clock when the two girls quitted their posts, but 
both of them attended to their duties cheerfully, and 
took it all as a matter of course Janie, according 
to her own statement, was not tired, only a little 
" muddled," and she regretted that such a thing as a 
Bank Holiday should exist, preferring rather to go to 
her work the next Monday as usual. 

On the whole, the girls were a fairly contented 
set, although the inconveniences under which they 
did their work was a trial to those who had held 
situations in more comfortably arranged places. 
Nearly all of them objected to the cement floor, 
which, they said, made their feet ache. It certainly 



Among the Laundry-Girls. 195 

would have entailed but little expense on the part of 
the proprietor to have had at least a portion of the 
room boarded over ; and the ironers, who were con- 
stantly obliged to walk to and from the stove, would 
have greatly appreciated a wooden floor. Some of 
the machinery, too, needed fencing in to make it less 
dangerous to those who were continually passing so 
very close to it as to make it highly probable that 
their skirts would be caught when the wheels were in 
motion. During my first two days I several times 
very narrowly escaped coming in collision with the 
hydro-extractor. There should also have been an 
arrangement for carrying off the steam, the odour 
from which was most sickening, and the need of an 
air-propeller, or fanning-machine, was very apparent. 
The constantly wet floor was another thing that must 
have been prejudicial to the health of those in the place. 

Indeed, taken as a whole, the sanitary conditions 
of the laundry could hardly have been worse ; and, if 
the proposed amendment is passed, some of its re- 
strictive clauses will readily apply to the state of things 

at the Y and Z Laundry. It is no excuse fur 

Mr. and Mrs. Morris to say that they have only lately 
gone into business, and cannot be expected to have 
all the comforts and conveniences of long-established 
laundries. Decency, as well as the laws of health, 
would demand that a few pounds be expended in 
fitting up the place to make it properly habitable 
for themselves, their workpeople, and their horses. 
The one large room in which the work is now done 
should be divided into at least three apartments 
wash-house, sorting-room, and ironing-room. 

When I engaged at the laundry, I had expected 
N 2 



196 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

to spend between eight and ten days there ; but Satur- 
day brought me such a weariness of the flesh that I de- 
cided I had better resign my situation before Mrs. 
Morris should have time to inform me that she did not 
consider me up to the mark for a laundry- worker. 

" I'm afraid I'm not strong enough for this sort of 
thing, Mrs. Morris," I said, as, standing with Janie in 
the doorway, I bade her good-night. 

" I was going to speak of that myself," she replied. 
" Somehow, you don't seem to have very much energy, 
and I would advise you to go into an easier kind of 
business." 

Energy! If she had only known the large 
amount of that article it had required to keep me 
in her laundry for five days, I am sure she would 
have changed her mind. 

" Miss Barnes is going to a confectioner's, Mis' 
Morris," said Janie, in a sort of defensive way, as 
though she thought I needed a champion. 

So my brief and very chequered career as a 
laundry-girl ended ; but, not having yet gained as 
much knowledge of the work and the workers as I 
wished, I determined to spend the following week 
among the laundry-girls in different parts of London, 
to discover if, after all, they were such a formidable 
and badly-treated class of individuals. 



CHAPTER V. 

"SOAP-SUDS ISLAND" AND THE EAST-END. 

ACTON is a village of tubs and clothes-lines. So 
many of its inhabitants are engaged in laundry-work, 



Among the Laundry-Girls, 197 

in a large and small way, that the place has been 
given the name of " Soap-suds Island." 

On Tuesday afternoon I went to Acton to make the 
acquaintance of the girls, whom I had heard from many 
quarters were typical representatives of their class. 

I waited for some time outside the gates of one of 
the large laundries, where many young girls were 
employed. At a little after seven o'clock the gates 
were swung back, and I found myself in a crowd of 
some forty or fifty women of all sizes and ages. I 
opened conversation by asking one of them the way 
to the station, and then I explained that I had come 
out to visit the laundry and wanted to interview them 
in regard to their opinion of the application of the 
Factory Act to laundries. They became interested 
at once, and, though some of them were woefully 
ignorant as to just what the Factory Act was, they 
one and all declared themselves in favour of shorter 
hours. I learned that at some of the laundries the 
girls commenced at six o'clock in the morning and 
worked until between seven and nine at night, ac- 
cording to whether or not it was a busy part of the 
season. At half-past seven they were allowed a half- 
hour for breakfast, which most of them carried with 
them. 

A little later I was invited to visit the Working 
Girls' Club, an organisation of laundry-girls started 
a few years ago by a number of ladies who be- 
came interested in helping them. There I intro- 
duced myself properly, told the girls how I had spent 
a week in a laundry, and that, wanting to know 
more about those engaged in the work, had come out 
to Acton. The fact that I had done laundry-work, 



198 Campaigns of Curiosity, 

no matter for what purpose, put me in their good 
graces at once, and they treated me as one of them- 
selves, inviting me to become a member of the club 
by the payment of fourpence a month, the fee re- 
quired of each member. The little room in which 
they met had been very comfortably fitted up. One 
corner at the back served for a sort of pantry, where 
tea was made on a small paraffin stove, and served to 
the girls by two young ladies who had been appointed 
to be their entertainers for the evening. 

I was told that it was not until some time after 
the club was started that the girls could be induced 
to say " Miss " and " Mrs." in addressing the officers, 
among whom were some of the best-known ladies in 
Acton. At the time of my visit, however, they had 
become accustomed to showing a certain amount of 
respect to their superiors. 

" Hi there, miss, I've fetched a copper and wants 
caike and tea," called out one girl to a quiet young lady 
who was boiling the kettle in the back of the room. 

" Very well, Lucy," she answered smilingly, with- 
out a sign of annoyance, and then a cup of tea and 
box of cake were brought to the table, where about 
twenty girls were gathered for what they termed 
" a bite." It was an interesting thirtg to me to 
watch this young lady taking the part of a servant 
and administering to the wants of the laundry-girls, 
who, despite the amusing familiarity of that " Hi there, 
miss," tried to the best of their ability to show proper 
respect by saying, " Thank ee, miss," when their orders 
were carried out. I joined them in their late tea, 
paying the stipulated price, a halfpenny for cake and 
the same for a cup of tea, including milk and sugar. 



Among the Laundry-Girls. 199 

The girls poured their tea into their saucers, and 
setting the cups on the table, made ugly rings on 
the red cover. 

11 See, you soil the table-cloth, putting the cups on 
it like that," I suggested to the girl who sat next me, 
drinking her tea from a saucer, while she held the 
dripping spoon in front of her. 

" Yes, miss, I sees it," she answered, and then 
turning to her companions, called out, " It's a shaime, 
girls. The laidy says we's spiling the cloth with the 
tea-cups. We must hold 'em in the other 'and when 
we drinks out the saucer." 

I noticed that most of them were very young, 
probably under eighteen. Their costumes were of 
the coster order, but many, if properly dressed, would 
have been good-looking young women. 

After tea, the lady who had served it was requested 
to " maike some tunes on the pianer," which she did 
with a right good will. Then the place was turned 
into a ball-room, and as each girl chose a partner, 
I was invited to " taike a turn." With first one and 
then another of the girls I joined them in their 
schottische to the tune of " Knocked 'em in the Old 
Kent Road," many of the girls singing as well as 
dancing. Then followed a polka to " Ta-ra-ra-boom- 
de-ay," and the programme ended with waltzing 
" After the ball was over," for which dance I had 
offered me a choice of a dozen partners. 

It was then nearly half-past nine, and, as one of 
the girls declared " the young laidy couldn't go to the 
staition alone," I left the club-room with an escort of 
five girls, who showed the liveliest interest in taking 
proper care of me. All the way to the station they 



2oo Campaigns of Curiosi'i v. 

kept up a continual talking on various subjects. 
They told me that a few of the girls at one of the 
laundries had lately joined the Salvation Army, and 
that there had been a " grait chainge " in them. 
Then they discussed the " Factory Hact," and begged 
me to use my influence in their behalf. They were 
not in favour of the hours that obliged them to be up 
before a little after five every morning and hurry off 



"•carn't yer see we've got a young laidy with us?"* 

to work at six without even so much as a cup of tea 
or coffee to stay them until the breakfast-hour. 

Once, when we had nearly reached the station, a 
crowd of boys in front of a public-house began throw- 
ing pebbles. One of my protectors threw back a 
missile with the injunction — 

" Better behaive there ! Carn't yer see we've got a 
young laidy with us?" and I could not help thinking 



Among the Laundry-Girls. 201 

what a pity they could not have a " young laidy " 
with them oftener. Who could foresee the results that 
such a state of things might bring about ! 

As my train moved out from the station, the girls 
ran along the platform as far as they could, giving me 
numerous farewell messages, and the last I heard from 
them was — 

" Saiy, miss, don't forget to maike 'em give us 
that Hact you told about." 

Having an invitation to visit their club on Sunday 
that I might inspect them in what they called their 
" church togs," I made them another call on that day, 
and found every girl arrayed in her Sunday best 
Cotton velvet was in great requisition, blue the 
favourite colour, and long plumed hats the ruling 
things in headgear. In the jewellery line heavy silver 
chains and lockets and threepenny-bit ear-rings were 
greatly in demand. Sunday afternoons they were 
allowed their tea without payment, the cost being 
covered by the subscription fee of fourpence a month. 
When I arrived, most of them had just returned from 
church, and had sundry original remarks to make 
about the service and the people in attendance. 

So I had mixed with the Acton girls, and suf- 
fered no bodily injury or moral contamination in 
consequence ! I did not go with the expectation 
of finding a great degree of refinement among them, 
and I was in no way disappointed. It is true that I 
may have met only the best of them, and I have no 
doubt that, had I remained long among them, some 
unpleasant knowledge would have been brought to 
me ; but, on the whole, considering the circumstances 
of their bringing up and their early surroundings, I 



202 Campaigns of Curiosity, 

could not see that they were deserving of the oppro- 
brium that I had heard cast upon them. 

Some time afterwards, accompanied by a young 
woman, who was herself a laundress, and had been 
appointed to make a report of the opinions of laun- 
dry employers and workers in regard to the Factory 
Act, I made a trip among the smaller establishments 
of the East-End. A few of the employers had not 
heard of the proposed amendment, and did not under- 
stand what it was about ; but on general principles 
they were opposed to it, and ordered us out of their 
shops. In Brick Lane, Whitechapel, I visited a laun- 
dry, that took in the shirts and "starched work" from 
the inhabitants of the neighbouring streets. Friday 
was the busy day at this place, for the reason that 
many of the customers were Jews, who, no matter 
how they dressed on other days, were always careful 
to garb themselves in clean white shirts for their 
Sabbath day. The proprietor of the laundry told 
me that quite often, when the work had not been 
finished up Friday night, some of his customers 
would come into the shop early Saturday morning^ 
and, with their coats buttoned up to their throats, 
wait about until their shirts were ironed, and then 
request the privilege of putting them on before going 
out into the street. This was the sort of place, too, 
where the young man who owns but one collar and 
one " front " always has them done up in time for 
Bank Holiday. 

In this laundry, as well as in the several other 
establishments in the neighbourhood of Whitechapel, 
I had an opportunity to become acquainted with 
many of the women employed in the ironing-rooms. 



Among the Laundry-Girls. 203 

I discovered that most laundry-girls married at a very 
early age. In fact, I found but few girls over twenty 
who were without husbands. One very pretty young 
woman smilingly told me that she had only been 
married the day before, and had come immediately 
back to her post as collar-dresser. Asking her why 
she married, when she saw no prospect of bettering 
her condition, she replied that she liked the work, 
and would not, if she could, remain at home all day. 
All of these young wives had what they called "homes ' 
— that is, two, three, or four rooms, with their own 
furniture in them. The girl who married and con- 
tinued to live with her parents or in lodgings was 
looked down upon as being particularly unfortunate 
or improvident. One young woman said that ever 
since she commenced work, at twelve years of age, 
she had been laying by a small sum each week 
against the day of her marriage, in order to pur- 
chase dishes, linen, and other things necessary for 
the fitting up of a home. 

" But how did you know you would get married?" 
I asked. 

" We all gets married. We has plenty of chances, 
never fear," was her answer, and she eyed me sus- 
piciously, as if wondering whether I had meant to 
insinuate that she was likely to have no "chances." 

To the minds of these girls the idea of marriage 
came as a matter of course. One girl confided to me 
that she had simply married because the other girls 
did. She was not going to have people say that 
nobody had ever asked her. That was an impu- 
tation that no laundry-girl with any self-respect 
could endure. 



204 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

Yet, notwithstanding the popularity of matrimony, 
none of them thought for an instant of giving up their 
trade. They said they returned to the work not so 
much because they must, as because they liked it. 
There appeared to be little or no domesticity about 
them. In the mornings they either left their husbands 
in charge of the rooms, or they locked the place up 
until the evening when they returned. Those who 
had children hired some old person — either a relative 
or a neighbour — to take care of them, at the rate of 
about three shillings a head weekly. When four or 
five children from the same family were to be looked 
after, there was a small reduction made. These 
laundry-workers were not without their theories 
concerning woman's "emancipation." When they 
married they had no thoughts of giving up what 
they termed their "independence." They clung to 
that with the greatest tenacity, and were under 
the impression that, by earning from ten to twenty 
shillings a week in a laundry, they were able to hold 
it fast. In a word, they all seemed " laundry-struck," 
and marriage seemed to mean no more to them than 
an escape from being called an " old maid." 

In most of the places that I visited the workers 
considered a certain daily portion of beer necessary to 
the proper performance of their duties. Some of the 
employers gave them a daily allowance; others, though 
refusing to supply it for their employees, permitted 
them to get it for themselves ; while in first-class places, 
where no beer was allowed on the premises, the 
women went to the public-houses and drank it at 
dinner and tea-time. In the ranks of laundresses, 
teetotalism is looked upon with suspicion and ridicule. 



Among the Laundry-Girls. 205 

In their opinion, a glass of beer is as essential to the 
correct ironing of a dozen shirts as is the flat-iron 
itself. I believe the amount considered necessary on 
which to do a good day's work (not counting " over- 
time," which demands a special allowance) is one 
and a half pints. If something could be done to 
convince not only laundry-women, but workers in 
other trades, that these two things, beer and early 
marriages, are their greatest hindrances in the way 
of social and intellectual progress an incalculable 
amount of good would come to all England. 

All the women were interested in the Factory 
Act, although some of them had not heard of its 
proposed application to laundries until it was ex- 
plained to them. Some of the daily and weekly 
workers expressed the opinion that even factory 
hours were unjust, when it was taken into considera- 
tion that the day of certain working men lasted only 
eight hours. Of course, in the laundries, Monday is 
not a busy day, the work seldom commencing until 
the afternoon, so that with the Saturday half- 
holiday, only five full days could be given ; but the 
majority of the workers preferred working Monday 
mornings, and being allowed to leave off earlier in the 
evening, which, they explained, could be easily managed 
if the employers would be willing to so arrange it. 

Most of the pieceworkers favoured the factory 
hours. It would really appear that regular hours from 
eight until six would be much better for all concerned. 
Many people, while deploring the ignorant condition 
of laundry-girls, do not stop to consider that their 
long hours give them really no time for self-improve- 
ment, even though they desired it. Only geniuses 



206 Campaigns of Curiosity. 

rise above their surroundings and surmount difficul- 
ties without other help ; and, as geniuses are rare 
and ordinary people are numerous, it is almost useless 
to attempt to do anything for laundry-workers under 
present conditions. If the hours of the young girls, 
at least, could be reduced so that their day would 
commence at eight and end at six, then night-schools 
might be established in the neighbourhoods of the 
large laundries, and from eight until ten the girls 
could be instructed and amused. Even though the 
Factory Act is made to apply to laundries, that 
requires them to work until eight o'clock. These 
hours are too long for girls between twelve and 
sixteen years of age, and it would seem that some 
special provision should be made for them. 

Many of the mothers, to their disgrace be it said, 
are opposed to any shorter hours for their daughters 
on the ground that it will give them more time to 
get into mischief! I had this reply from several 
women whose daughters were employed in laundries 
where the hours were from six in the morning until 
seven or eight at night. And these women, twenty 
years ago, married " because the other girls married," 
and then left their children to be taken care of for 
three shillings a week ! At twelve the girls were 
put to laundry-work, and henceforth left to their 
own devices. There is not much wonder that they 
got into " mischief," and no one is so much to blame 
for it as their own mothers. To ignorance, more than 
to a natural inclination for vice, may be ascribed all 
the immorality that is said to exist among laundry- 
girls. That there should be immorality under such 
conditions is no more cause for surprise than that the 



Among the Laundry-Girls. 207 

whitest snow should become tinged with the black 
of the smoke through which it falls. 

So far as I have become acquainted with laundry- 
girls, I would say that they are not so bad a set as 
is commonly supposed. They are kind-hearted, and 
would go out of their way to help the more unfortu- 
nate of their own class. They are grateful to anyone 
who really tries to help them in the right way, which 
is by putting oneself as much as possible on a level 
with them and not attempting to show any superiority. 
To the person who " puts on airs " these girls have a 
peculiar method of showing their disapproval, whether 
she be a worker in the laundry or a benevolent lady 
from the West-End. 

I have discovered that injurious chemicals are not 
nearly so much used in first-class places as many 
agitators would lead us to believe. Carbolic acid 
and chloride of lime are more often made use of in 
the smaller hand laundries than in the steam laundries, 
although in the latter places the large quantities of 
soda and cheap soaps might be considerably lessened. 

I spent one day in searching for the " laundry 
dens/' of which I had read and heard so much. I 
found a few places where the sign, " Washing and 
Mangling," led me up or down some dozens of rickety 
stairs to rooms where I was informed that "a laidy 
took in washing ; " but the clothes washed belonged 
to people but little above the washerwoman herself in 
station. On inquiring the names of their customers, 
I was given certain addresses where mostly working 
men of the lower orders lived. Such " laundries" are 
not patronised by first-class people, although the 
sweating system, which is followed by some superior 



208 



Campaigns of Curiosity. 



laundries, may sometimes bring about serious results 
to their customers. These places, which are really 
the most dangerous in London, sublet the work they 
receive to women living in miserable hovels, and then 
pass it off on their customers as having been done in 
their own establishments. 

From the large steam laundries there is nothing 
to fear in this direction. It is only the smaller laun- 
dries that countenance the sweating system. How- 
ever, it would doubtless be a good plan if all 
would personally inspect the places where they send 
their clothes, and demand references from those who 
apply for their custom. Such a course would, perhaps, 
save them all the wear and tear of nerves that I 
experienced when I started out in quest of "Mrs. 
Johnstone," who lived "somewhere near 'Ammer- 
smith." 

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